On The Way Down
by HarvestMoonRacoon
Summary: [Sequel to NekoChan] On the way down, Rian found Rock Lee, and it took something like true love to save her from herself. LeeOC, AnkoGai, NejiTen, a weird little ItachiOC in future chapters, and OCOC.
1. Introduction The Days Of Our Youth

**Author's Note: Well, here it is! The sequel to my Lee/OC story "_Neko-Chan_". Welcome to everyone, and I hope the continuation of the lives of Lee and Rian can bring you at least a fraction of as much happiness as my first multi-chaptered story about their relationship did. Hi to all my old readers! Hi, peoples! -smiles like a crazed person and waves at them-**

**For those of you who don't know who Rian is, you probably haven't read "Neko-Chan", the original story of my OC and Lee's story. I suggest you read it. All of it. No matter how cappy it seems. After chappie Six, it gets better, I swear. It was just my first multiple chapter, so at first it stunk, yeah. But, it gets better! I swear! Ask any of my readers!**

**The first chapter is to fill you in on the seven years between "Neko-Chan" and here, "On The Way Down". Rian and Lee are now 22 and 21, and I think there may be some Anko/Gai in some of the other chapters. Is that too crackish, for I speak as a Gai/Any Female fangirl. **

**So, say 'Hi' to my newest story, and I promise to have three new "30 Ways" up really quick, my reviewers. **

**This chapter dedicated to The Funky Platypus, because he's so darn awesome, and I promised him.**

**... I'm trying to think of some famous quote I can put here to herald the beginning of a new part of Lee and Rian's life.. Ah, how about, "CHAAAAAAARGE!".**

Countdown to present day. Begin-

Seven;

"Love me forever?"

Lee's face turned grave for a moment, but in that moment truth was revealed.

And very gently, as though she were as precious as the fleeting Summers of youth, Lee bent down and kissed her the answer.

And their lips met in an innocent expression of their undying affection for each other, Rian remembered what she had been searching for when Neko-Chan had discovered her sitting on a log in the woods. It wasn't Neko-Chan's knowledge or to be a splendid ninja.

It was love.

* * *

Six;

Neji! Come on!"

"I have to get it!" the Hyuuga jounin screamed, his voice rising above the raging flames that threatened to bring the entire building down around their heads.

"No, Neji! The roof is coming down! We have to get-"

Gai scowled in desperation as the back of Neji's singed robe disappeared into the pyre of orange and red, undaunted as he side-stepped falling debris and sparks that rained down from the flaming rafters above him.

The hurried form of Rian rushed by, pushing both bent forms from her way as the green-eyed Chuunin, orbs narrowed in determination, rushed through the burning doorframe after her teammate's back.

"No, no, no!" Lee screeched, lunging forward to go after his girlfriend. Surely his teammates would be trapped with no escape from the flames of a burning Otogakure. Panic making his system throb with adrenaline, the pounding of blood beside his eardrums screamed louder than the snarl of the ever-present fire.

Orochimaru's body, pinned to the wall with kunai like a crucified man, stood bleeding and defeating, flames licking his feet near them as Gai's hand shot out, catching the back of Lee's shredded jumpsuit. He wasn't about to let Lee get killed, too. All for a stupid-

"Stay, Lee!" Gai scolded above the roar and hiss of fire all around them The smell of blackening wood was pungent as the two stood, bleeding beneath their shredded suits and waiting for any sign of life to emerge from the burning library within the midst of the vanquished Hidden Sound village.

Ashen eyes wide with horror, Sensei and pupil could only watch in despair as no forms emerged from the storehouse of the traitor Orochimaru's private scrolls. The entire Hidden Sound, demolished by Leaf Shinobi, was being evacuated of Konoha's ninja, their mission of burning Otogakure to the ground complete. Neji had turned on his heels and fled through piles of flaming Otonin corpses and flying soot to rescue a precious scroll. His team had chased him back into the burning village, threading their way through ashen roads and shattered oxen carts to find their cell member, who they thought had gone mad from overexposure to smoke.

Suddenly, the flames parted in a whoosh of a swiping arm, and Rian and Neji emerged from the smoldering doorway, coughing and choking on ash. Neji clasped a rice paper scroll of an ancient technique within the fold of his robes, his wide sleeve beating the flames from the singed edge.

Racing blindly into the smash of a familiar chest, Rian's smoke-weakened body slumped against Lee's for a moment too soon.

An instant before the entire building exploded, Lee snatched Rian into his cracked and bleeding arms and dragged his ardor from the range of the blast.

Team Gai ran, fleeing the smoldering gates of the ashen remains of Orochimaru's dream, to Neji's bouncing chest a last shot at his complete team.

* * *

Five;

Squinting, Gai let his eyes rove over his pressed and ironed clothes in the full-length mirror before him.

Perhaps it was because they weren't green or spandex that he felt uncomfortable in them.

"Are you two sure?" the Green Beast asked for the two-hundredth time that night, eyes riveted to the penguin print on his dark blue tie.

Rian's head popped out from one side of the mirror, her cat-like eyes glinting at her appropriately dressed sensei. In clothes normal human beings wore, Gai was actually quite handsome.

"She will love it. Take my word, Gai-sensei. I'm a woman. We know these things." the neko child said, grinning with pointed teeth.

Looking uneasy, Gai glanced flightily at his prized pupil as Lee jabbed a bouquet of purple-colored flowers at his mentor's chest, admiring for a moment how awesome his sensei looked in pinstripes.

They both walked Gai to the door, Lee with one hand steadying his teacher's quivering arm. For a fearless ninja, Gai was sure acting like a spooked horse over this trivial matter.

The jounin turned to look back at his two pupils as Rian and Lee prodded him gently onto his front stoop. He knew the minute he was out that they would lock his house's door, making it impossible for him to back out of his tête-à-tête .

"Good luck, Gai-sensei!" Lee added, Rian reaching out to straighten the crisp crease of Gai's dress shirt's collar an instant before Lee slammed the door in Gai's face. There the click of the deadbolt, and the sounds of the couple tittering behind the wooden door.

Sighing, Gai loosened his penguin tie (Lee's idea.) and decided to get the last word in.

"No making out on my couch!" he shouted, grinning at the silence as Rian and Lee both flushed dark red on the other side of the front door. Almost as an afterthought, knowing Rian's devious libido, he added, "And nothing on my bed, either!"

Done beaming his triumph, Gai turned and began to try to swagger as manly as possible toward Anko's apartment. It was just dinner, he kept telling himself. Just a meal with a woman in a skimpy skirt. He could handle a drunken Lee, a cranky Rian, and Neji in general. So, he could definitely handle a date with Mitirashi Anko.

* * *

Four;

"Neji's ten minutes late." Lee duly noted, kicking his legs tiresomely against the edge of the stone wall on which he sat.

A gale ruffling her shaggy brown hair, Rian nodded at the horizon, her expression placid.

"Yeah. What the heck does he want us for, any way? He already kicked my ass in training today." she spat, before leaning her head onto Lee's shoulder tediously.

Gai tapped his fingers in succession to the pebbly granite on which his cell, minus Hyuuga Neji, and of course Tenten, sat upon. Said Jounin had asked his squad to meet together at a small barrier wall near the edge of Konohagakure for some reason unbeknownst to the gathered party.

"He better not make me miss my youthful match with Kakashi. He's two points ahead of me already." Gai stated, narrowing his eyes at the scalding silence that hung around his two pupils.

"You won't be missing any match." came Neji's voice from behind them.

Three heads simultaneously turned to face their belated squad member, ready to scold him for making them wait when they had much better things to do.

And there was Neji, beaming like a search light in the dark, his lavender eyes smiling with the curves of his lips.

"Hi, guys." came a feminine voice, an instant before the long-lost member of Team Gai strode from the bushes behind the Hyuuga prodigy.

"Tenten!" Lee screeched, before he promptly fainted into Rian's lap.

So Orochimaru's resurrecting technique really did work.

They could scold Neji later. But, for now, Team Gai was complete again. In more than one way.

* * *

Three:

"Please?"

Rian could only stare into Lee's begging eyes as he gripped her hand, staring up at her from where he was down on one knee, half out the door of her apartment. His raven eyes were pleading, beseeching an answer to possibly the most important question he had ever asked her.

Her stillness was one of shock, not of repulsion. In his shattered mind, Lee didn't know whether to interpret Rian's action as acceptance, or shock, or-

All at once, she was down on the ground and within the circle of leather-clad arms, face pressed to the chest where Lee's heart was thumping like a bird in a cage. A taut breath caught in the throat above her, an instant before her answer burst from it's prison within her mind.

"Yes!" she nearly screamed, before hugging his neck so tightly she thought it would snap in half.

"Yes, yes- Oh my God, yes!"

Tears were soon coursing down both of their cheeks as they embraced on the floor of Rian's apartment, laughing and sobbing and hugging each other as if they let go, they would lose this moment forever.

Sniffling, Rian groped for Lee's hand until she could clench it and squeeze her joy into his palm.

Still sobbing, Lee rested his chin on the top of Rian's head in a comforting gesture exhibited in their teenage years. He couldn't compose himself enough to even speak adequately.

"Of course I'll marry you." she whispered, reassurance to herself.

* * *

Two;

"So, let me get this straight."

Lee looked nervously at his yellow-slathered hands, while Rian grinned sheepishly at the head of chocolate hair greased with the substance. The owner of said tresses didn't look too happy with either of them right about than, but that was a given.

Neji was snorting with trying to keep from laughing outright at the situation, wishing he had a camera to capture this moment of his teammate's stupidity.

"He put his head between the railing of the stairs." Tenten recanted, sounding exasperated, either with her three year old son or the Rock couple crouched on either side of her first son's exposed head.

"And you two tried- to grease his head, so that it would slide out…"

Rian and Lee nodded guiltily, where young Ai's face crumpled with fury at his parent's lack of action to dislodge him from the predicament his babysitters had only been trying to get him out of.

"-With butter." Tenten finished, massaging between her eyes. Upstairs, Hyuuga Kei, Neji and Tenten's second child, woke from her sleep and began to cry for attention.

Neji hopped up the stairs two at a time, waiting to burst into laughter over his newborn daughter's crib.

Sighing, Tenten strode over to her son's goopy head to examine the situation. Rian and Lee looked at each other guiltily over their teammate's back. The mother of two children began trying to push her son's head out to the side where Ai was crouched, his head lodged between the wooden railings of the stairs that led to the second floor of the Hyuuga's abode.

"I can't even go out to dinner with your father without you getting into trouble with your equally stupid babysitters, can I?" Tenten asked, while Ai gazed guiltily at the floor.

Lee took the tub of butter back into the kitchen, while Rian attempted to help Tenten shove Ai's head from between the railings of the stairs.

Something told Lee he and Rian wouldn't be charging anything for tonight's babysitting.

* * *

One;

"Please don't hurt her!" the young medic cried breathlessly. "Wait!"

Amazingly, Itachi ceased his artifice show of power, slackening his vice grip around Rian's throat and dully pressing the kunai to neck. His bored expression seemed to exhibit his dislike of this tiresome sham, and implored the Leaf Shinobi to explain so that he could finish the capture of another Biju and go do something better.

"Please…" Sachi breathed, her emerald eyes welling with tears. Lee's eyes slid cautiously over to Sachi, his vision coloring crimson as blood dripped from the gash on his forehead. Clouding pain and the electric atmosphere made it hard for him to see, but he knew. Something huge was about to be revealed.

"No." Rian mouthed, trying to hush the sobbing teenager, who seemed to pull herself together enough under the gaze of blood colored Sharingan.

"Please don't hurt her-" Sachi sobbed. Itachi's cape billowed menacingly in a gust of wind that interrupted the mood, misshaping his body beneath the red-clouded blackness. His glare demanded the troublesome redhead to speak than, or forever hold her tongue.

Lee only had time to gasp a fiery breath before his entire world bottomed out.

"She's pregnant." Sachi gasped.

The years have been filled in to the present. The countdown to the end of three people you have known and loved begins-

Now.

**

* * *

****A/N: Alright! Who's not dead? Sound off! ****Remember, this is an introduction to fill you in up to the present, which is the last italicized event. Woah-ha-ha. Cliffies. **

**Review and be glomped by your ol' pal HMR.**


	2. First Step To The End

**Author's Note: Ergh. Writer's Blaaaah returns with a vengence. That, and my mother is limiting my time online to ten minutes a day. Plus, I'm not speaking to my best friend, and my allergies are killing me. One good thing has come out of this new stage in my life, however. (See my profile.) I've had a chance to catch up on the chapters I needed to already have written! A week on vacation with my dad gave me some time to think out the plot, and I must say, this story is looking great, even by my standards.**

**If you get the chance, check out my revamped profile!**

Lee jolted back awake as a warmth against his chest shifted, rustling the bed sheets as the object scooted closer to him.

He had almost fallen asleep again, he pieced as he shook his head slightly. The room was just so still, and the lights were so dim, and the head digging into the crook of his neck was just so inviting.

Blinking the sleep from his eyes, Rock Lee stared across the stark bedroom, eyeing the opposite wall while he grappled for an early morning hold on reality. The white paint began to solidify in front of his bleary eyes as he struggled to remain awake. Seconds later, he was shaking his head again, gently, trying to shake the exhaustion from his consciousness.

Lee shifted slightly, trying to shift his body enough to be sitting up slightly, but not enough to disturb the curled fist lying on his opposite shoulder, nor the rest of the silken body draped limply against his side.

His shoulders smashed against the painted backboard of the small bed, Lee unceremoniously kicked one leg free of the blanket, wisely deciding not to kick the other one, lest he drag the person entangled with it from her sleep.

The fellow made an ineligible noise somewhere between a pig snort and a passing of gas, his lips quivering as he announced to the rest of his body that it was to wake up. A large yawn followed this, before Lee brought his free hand up and brushed the square bangs from his wide eyes.

A clank and rattle sounded to his left, before the square, sturdy air conditioner unit at the wall groaned to life. It sounded almost as reluctant to wake as Lee was.

The sound of the coffee maker hissing and spitting on the kitchen counter in the other room slowly began to bring the lanky young man back to full awareness. In moments, he caught the smell of fresh-brewed coffee emanating from the room down the hall. Hungrily, he licked his dry, grimy lips, catching the combined tastes of chocolate Pop Tart and sweat from yesterday's training session. He was starving, his stomach reminded him, squelching audibly as Lee's thoughts turned to wondering if the donuts he had snagged from the Jounin's Waiting Room had gone stale yet.

A little braver this time, the raven haired young man sat up, bare back to the headboard. The head lying on his shoulder shifted with him, to Lee's dismay. The limp body against him shifted of it's own accord, one hand rising to fist against his chest. A laughing smile spread over Lee's countenance as the decidedly female face against his chest contorted to a scowl, before his vision filled with a mane of shaggy, sleep-mussed brown hair.

Startled awake, the rumpled form sat upright, withdrawing herself from where she had tangled her arms around the Green Beast in the night. Holding herself up, the woman shook her head violently, causing her oversized shirt to slide down one shoulder, baring a pale, scarred shoulder to the drop in temperature.

"Good morning, sleepyhead." Lee said sing-songedly, pushing himself from where he had been positioned and wrapping one arm around her thin, slouched shoulders. He pulled her close in the crook of his elbow, before taking a deep breath, leaning in, and blowing a sloppy, wet raspberry on her sleep-crusted cheek.

Rian immediately screeched, before bursting into a fit of laughter. She thrashed uselessly against his grip, kicking her legs into entanglement in the sheets. Her attempts at escape were most fatally hampered by her uncontrollable laughter, though.

After a few seconds of the torture, she pushed his arm away with both hands, giggling like a small child being tickled. She hated when he did that. But my, was it a wake-up call.

"Alright, strudel-brain, I'm awake." she gurgled, snorting with the remnants of laughter. Her voice was hazy and mellow, but awake and smiling. Lee just continued to grin, before pulling his knees to his chest and letting his long, tanned arms drape over his kneecaps. He rested his head between his elbows, staring passively as Rian cracked her shoulder blades, a morning ritual.

Such mornings were rare nowadays in the Rock household, and therefore all the more to be cherished.

Lee was usually away on ambassadorial missions, or teaching taijutsu at the Academy to help with his family's finances, or lack thereof. Rian was kept busy by her numerous assassination missions as an advanced member of her village's Anbu patrol. Most of the time, their apartment was empty, save for one of them for weeks at a time, with only the broken coffee maker for comfort.

Rian and Lee's marriage might not have been advantageous, but the one thing there was more of in their cramped apartment than emptiness was love. And, they figured, as long as they had that, than everything else could take a back seat.

Yes, the relationship between Nibi No Rian and Rock Lee had continued to flower in the years after their first confessions. Only two short years ago, Lee had taken the plunge and popped the question, which Rian had wholeheartedly accepted. It seemed it had only been days ago, truthfully. People were still placing bets on when the honeymoon was going to end, and Rian would kick Lee out or something.

Unfortunately, the men who had collected quite a pot of cash over who would be the first to realize the absurdity of their relationship didn't seem to understand the workings between the Nekomata Jinchuuriki and the village's Taijutsu master, or the depth of their loyalty to one another.

Lee might still be a Green Beast who followed in his sensei's exact path, and Rian might be the accursed container of a Tailed Beast. But there was pure, innocent love between them. Stronger webs of loyalty, affection, and heartfelt adoration for the other than anybody could ever even hope of breaking.

Their love wasn't perfect, or lust-brimmed. It was simply pure.

Why it took so long for people to realize that was beyond either of them. Lee and Rian were more content to simply be in each other's presence continually, and _legally _be able to sleep together than anything else. (Their first, eh, tête-à-tête, had been six years of pent hormones and libido. Finish the equation.)

As of now, the couple had had two weeks of a break in missions and classes to spend with each other, for which they were exceedingly grateful for.

This had resulted in a lot of bonding time between Lee and his wife, who's every idiosyncrasy he already knew as though they were one, and vice versa. They had been having a great time, attempting to cook, training together, playing Twister until they ended up in some horribly erotic position all twisted around each other, coming home exhausted from watching Neji and Tenten's little tribe of children, and just plain snuggling on the couch when the satellite blinked out.

That was were the purity came into their relationship. They weren't in each other's pants every night. Somedays it was just plain collapsing on the couch and watching T.V, Rian snuggled up against Lee's shoulder. And other times it was Lee trying to make something edible for the both of them, and than both of them having to put out the flames that engulfed the countertop. It was catching fireflies in their hands on languid summer nights, and pouncing on each other to tickle them until they cried at completely indiscriminant moments.

They didn't need sex to show each other that they were loved, like so many relationships of the now-grown Konoha genin. There was more than enough love in the little, silly things like that.

So, the Rock clan remained a pure, happy, rather odd functioning family, despite it's few members. Yes, no children had come of Rian and Lee's union, due to the fact that Rian lacked one necessary organ to produce the next generation. But, the two ignored this, and had never spoken of the pitter-patter of little Lee's feet up and down the halls. Every day that Lee woke up to Rian clinging to him in her slumber, and when Rian would politely swallow Lee's attempts at food, they both knew. Just they were enough.

Lee ducked to avoid Rian swiping a pillow at his face playfully. In seconds, his arms were around her waist, pinning her to the mattress as he crawled up her squirming body with a free hand. Rian kicked her legs from where they were entangled in the sheets, giggling and huffing with laughter as she realized what he was going to do. Still keeping her gently down with one forearm, Lee's hands darted downwards sharply as his earthen-haired lover continued to thrash, laughing at the top of her lungs.

She screeched a climax when he began to tickle the inside of her knees. Squirming madly, she tried futilely to push her husband away. That was the downside of being married. Lee knew her one weakness. Rian was deathly ticklish on the insides of her knees.

Having mercy upon his poor, vanquished wife, Lee withdrew his hands, laughing almost as loudly as Rian. He pulled himself level with her as she lay backwards, her feet propped on the thin edge of the headboard. Her body was still shaking with her deep, throaty huffs of laughter, sweat beads like dots of crystal on her reddened face. Rian's flat, bandaged chest poked through the open collar of her turtleneck sweater that was serving as her pajama shirt, while her arms emerged somewhere underneath the pools of the oversized sleeves.

She ceased her laughing when she noticed a look of worry and concern across Lee's face as he lay beside her.

"What?" she asked, cocking a distinguished eyebrow at him in her tested _I know there's something you're not telling me and I want to know ™ _look.

Lee seemed to have been lost in thought, for he startled back, staring with a glimmer of worry in the corner of his sable eyes.

Noting the expression on his beloved wife's face, the tall man conceded what hope of defeat he might have held. There were no secrets in their marriage, and the glare she was giving him told him that she had been let on, and wouldn't give in until she knew exactly what was bothering him.

"Just-" Lee chose his words carefully, not wanting to somehow upset the love of his life. Pausing in thought, Lee looked away from her, licking his lips as though to tempt the right saying to his tongue.

"You seem- off. You've gotten weaker, and you're tired all the time. Your aim was off during yesterday's training, and I was moving all around when you were asleep, and you hardly even blinked. I'm worried about you, Rian." he said truthfully.

Rian's expression was one of concern. Had she been slacking? Perhaps it was just stress. Being her village's resident Sanken proficienado, a highly respected Black Op, and a Jinchuuriki could have something to with it.

But, now that Lee mentioned it, she was tiring out more easily, too. She was spending her normal chakra faster, and she had felt as though she had had the flu for nearly a week, now. She had been writing it off as a bug, probably caught from one of Neji and Tenten's little nose picking moppets that she and Lee were called upon to baby-sit out of obligation to their teammates, but when she had vomited her coffee yesterday, she had begun to feel a little concerned, herself. All kinds of poisonings and deaths had flooded Rian's thinking, only further agitating Lee's ulcerous concern when she had been distracted for a day or two.

However, for now she smiled, easing Lee's concern by grinning and tilting her head into the mattress.

"I know. I'm going to have Tsunade give me a check-up at the Hospital. I need a clean bill of health to be promoted to Anbu captain, anyway."

Rian looked up from the cotton sheets, her taut expression's place being taken by an easy smile.

"I'm glad you noticed, though." she whispered, as though she were really surprised. She was not. Lee was overprotective, if not insanely worried about Rian, and had been since she had first been declared a precious person. She knew it was because he loved her, and she never truly was bothered by his tireless concern. She simply tried to return his worry in full to show him that he meant the same to her, and hope that he didn't get an ulcer from worrying about her.

Lee seemed content, and pulled his body to hers, a peace filled smile coming over his face as he snuggled into the crook of her neck.

The action was the equivalent of speaking _If you need to talk, you can tell me anything. I love you, and will protect you with my life._ Another thing about being married was learning to read your partner's silent comfortings, besides relying on the verbal and physical displays alone.

That came of a true love, she supposed.

"I just have one question."

Lee looked up, his face painted with concern. Rian's sly smile quickly comforted that fear, however. He knew she was going to do something silly, or say something that would make light of the feelings she knew he was feeling. Rian had an amazing sense of humor, one that Lee appreciated being there to quiet his worry-wartness, as Rian called it.

"Who gets the shower first?" she asked challengingly.

In less than a second, they were both up and zooming down the hall to the only bathroom.

Rian zipped between Lee's legs as he shot through the bedroom door, sliding on her knees down the hallway, to which Lee placed a hand on her head and shoved her at where the living room met the narrow hall.

Lee's wife of two years was a thin sprite of a person with dirty colored hair. Brown bangs were always long and nearly hid the Konoha stamp on her forehead protector when she wore it. Her piercing, almost frighteningly dark green eyes sparkled beneath them. They had been slanted slightly by the presence of her sealed Biju, but for the most part were the haunting memory Lee carried most from their youth of her.

She was horribly thin, her muscles sinewy with the stains of her Shinobi occupation, but her speed and strength taught her opponents a valuable lesson of never underestimating a slight ninja. Her village's nearly only remaining user of Sanken, Blood Fist Taijutsu style, Rock Rian was a well known and respected Shinobi, both for her Chuunin rank and the Two Tailed Neko that was sealed inside her.

Rian tumbled onto her side near the small futon couch, but not before she grabbed Lee's ankle. As gravity pulled her down, Lee was jerked off balance, skidding on one foot as Rian yanked him to the side.

Clambering up by using Lee as an anchor, Rian growled playfully and tried to shove Lee behind her, while he grabbed her shirt collar, displaying equal determination.

Lee was a great bear of a young man, not as strong in appearance as his years of brutal training had made him. His appearance still mimicked his teacher's, Maito Gai, for whom Lee still held honor and respect. Lanky and full, he towered over his other team members, much to Neji's discontent. The Hidden Leaf's resident taijutsu proficient, compassionate Rock Lee had a heart bigger than his brain, which never really hindered him. His emotions strengthened him, and he had plenty of feelings, positive and negative both, to run on without ever coming up short.

After grappling for a minute or so, waiting for the right opportunity, they simultaneous broke grips and shot towards the grimy tile room once more. Shoulder to shoulder, they tried to duck and climb over each other, using the walls of the hallway as wedging points in turn as they neared the small room. They both knew the conditions this little rush entailed. The loser had to use the dish-washing, squirter implement on the kitchen sink for a shower.

Giving a brute shove, Rian ducked to skid on her stomach over the threshold of the bathroom door, just as Lee shoved down on her head, attempting to pin her to the floor. They hit the molding of the bathroom door simultaneously, Rian managing to wedge herself between Lee and the doorframe at the last possible second.

With a last shove to his collarbone, Rian knocked Lee backwards and slammed the bathroom door as he stumbled for balance. To no avail, however; Cursing, Lee tipped backwards bounced on his behind on the wooden floor.

As silence began to descend on the apartment, he pulled himself into a sitting position, long legs bent in front of him and scowled at the chipped paint of the entrance. On the other side of the door, Rian cackled like a mad scientist. A second later, her heard the lock click, therefore denying him any entrance.

Sighing, he yanked himself up and slumped towards the kitchen sink. He really hated that dish washing thing. It only spewed cold water, anyway. And the Ajax made his sweat smell funny, too.

Well, it wasn't too great a sacrifice, either way. For Rian, he would spend the rest of his life smelling like Apple-Orange dishwashing soap, if he had to.

* * *

"So, I was like, "Heck yes!", and he, like, starts talking about-"

"Enough already!" came an exasperated, aged teenage voice.

The stark white cat and dog-creature gave a sharp glance at the hissed whisper, but the faces behind the white porcelain masks secretly snickered at the relief. Keeping yourself hidden in the shadows of a forest's leaves was the tiniest bit easier without an angsty narrative of teenage life from an inhumanely squeaky teen girl's voice.

Black hair shifted with the turn of a young man's head. The Chuunin looked disapprovingly at his female teammates, his dark eyes narrowing with anger.

"You two shut it. You're going to get all of us skewered." came his slow and deliberate opinion in a stern order. He eyed the two women crouched in the shrubbery beneath him frustratedly, gripping the tree trunk to his right tightly enough to make bark splinters come loose into his calloused palm.

The slightest of the Black Op squad sighed loudly, before ripping off her red-striped mask and throwing it headlong into the darkness of the forest surrounding them.

Red-blond hair, no longer contained, cascaded down the young teenager's shoulders with the release of the mustard-colored strings that held the mask in place. Her painted lips were twisted into a pout, green eyes narrowed in disgust.

"Why do we have to wear those masks anyway? They're, like, so annoying."

The girl than yanked at her Chuunin vest, pulling it as far away as she could from her skin. Beneath the olive flak jacket was a brightly colored shirt almost as sunny as her disposition.

"And these vests! Ugh! They're just horrid, is what they are! Who in their right min-"

This sentence was cut off by a sharp squeal as a pair of gloved hands wrenched around the fragile throat. A young woman with a Black Op mask that resembled a Tanuki leapt into view from behind the teenaged girl.

"Will you shut up?" the Ichibi hissed, before earning a squeal from her troublesome squad member as she shoved the girl backwards, making her fall unceremoniously onto her backside.

"Ow! Kura!" the teenager wailed, before swiping at the leaves and mud clinging to her.

The man crouched in the tree above the two shifted to gaze down at the team members that he felt like murdering right about now. Didn't they know the importance of _silence_ when stalking an unknown enemy?

The question seemed rhetorical, at least to him.

"If you two don't be quiet, I'm swear to the Kami I'll slit your throats, stick your bodies on poles, and put them in front of the Hokage Tower as a warning to other inexperienced, flighty little girls!"

These words were a little louder than the foreboding Chuunin would have preferred, but they got their point across nicely.

"Natto." came a whisper nearby. The Chuunin sighed defeatedly at the voice of his apparent leader, knowing that it wasn't his job to be short with these women.

The second kunoichi flipped her mask over her head, so that it rested on her high ponytail. Her eyes were set like shining gemstones of an emerald color, deep and dark green.

"Oh, Natto. The poor girl can't help it if she wasn't cut out to be a Black Op. Blame the damned new Hokage." the red-haired woman hissed, before purposely slamming the raccoon mask back over her fine features.

As of than, the four visible Anbu sighed simultaneously. The first from trying to remove the mud from the back of her pants, the second from having their elder teammate reprimand her for something she hadn't done, the third from having this joke of a team, and the fourth from having to watch over them all.

There were five on Cell 19, all positioned in the elephant ear plants surrounding the small group of tents that had yet to be recognized as a threat to Konoha, their own homeland. Cell 19 had been ordered to scope out the members of a forming rebellion against their country's peace treaty with Konoha. It was a A-rank sentry duty, no more, no less. Little or no fighting was to be required, claimed the Leaf's newest Hokage.

He was dead wrong.

"Natto." came the voice again. The dark haired Chuunin turned as his leader's green-striped mask emerged from the dark leaves near him.

"Take Kura and Sachi over to the right of the encampment. If we encounter any resistance, I'm counting on Kura's Esuna to mow them down. Than Rian and I will lead the approach."

The man known as Natto grimaced behind his mask of white porcelain.

"You mean, get the two miscreants out of your hair?" he asked, voice tweaking with sarcasm.

The other black haired Anbu nodded, eyes hungry through the holes carved for vision.

Natto gave a knowing nod, before dropping from his place on the branch to directly between his female teammates. In a few moments, three flashes of white and black whizzed through the tree line.

The face behind the aptly-chosen green beast mask sighed as he watched his cell go, rocketing through the leaves around them with nary a sound to betray their very existence. In a dreamlike state, Rock Lee pushed the mask up his face, eyes still to the three mere movements that nearly blended into the forest, so well camouflaged that they could be animals or the wind blowing the leaves to the untrained eye.

Half of him hoped that his patched team would refrain from killing each other. Tension was always taut between their eldest female and the second male member of the squad, and when young Sachi wasn't treating wounds, her mouth was running, which annoyed everyone to no end. Somehow, Lee hoped that he could make a true Shinobi squad out of them, the kind that relied on each other to the death. He knew they were far from that goal, between Kura's stand-offishness, Natto's inability to act in any way that resembled empathy, and Sachi's- well, 'Sachi-ness'.

The motley crew under Lee's care at present consisted of three Chuunin, aged 21, 19, and 17, all of whom threatened to drive him insane on a regular basis.

There was Kura, a Suna nin who had recently switched alliances to Konoha. The red-head had a fiery temper and was a little less than patient with their youngest member. Kura's wind-based ninjutsu could be used for long-ranged attacks, which was a major trump card in a skirmish. Trademarks of her birth country, Kura not only carried her aptness for Shinobi skill, but the stony disposition that seemed to harden the face of every Suna kunoichi.

Natto, in one word, was foreboding. The pessimistic man seemed ready to take Kura's head off at the drop of a hat, and had absolutely no patience, except when concerning surveillance. In truth, he was an excellent, hardened Shinobi and well above average with ninjutsu, but he still creeped Lee out sometimes. The man just had no empathy for anyone but himself, and only occasionally showed any emotion besides anger, something Lee couldn't relate to.

And than there was Sachi. Sachi, Sachi, Sachi. Lee found himself shaking his head fondly.

The young girl was unbearable. Concerned with her appearance to the point of distraction, she was constantly getting herself or her teammates endangered on missions. She could hardly fight, only becoming a Chuunin from sheer luck. Her aim was miserable, and Kura or Natto were constantly having to watch the useless child's back. She was really a brat, and horribly lazy when it came to ninja training. It was a shame, for her kekkei genkai could be utilized, if only she could put it to use. Thankfully, Sachi was nearly the legendary Tsunade's medical equal, and was highly valued for her amazing healing abilities.

All in all, they were an odd bunch, unprepared to be team members, but prepared to do their Shinobi duty. In Lee's book, that made them excellent ninja.

Said taijutsu master was the co-leader of Squad 19. Lee's raw power made up for his lack in gen and nin jutsu. Training had made the twenty two year old capable of opening five to six gates with minimal damage, far from his first battle with the Sand ninja Gaara. To this, he had added his traditional taijutsu, only the far greater versions of them, such as Konoha Dai Senpuu, and Kage Tajuu Buyo.

Still, he depended on the fifth member of Cell 19 to watch his back during the more engaging fights.

A form no louder than a shadow dropped beside him, barely rumpling a leaf as she landed crouched, one hand keeping her balance in front of her.

- Who had just shown up.

"Sorry." came Rian's sorrowful voice.

Lee smiled at his wife, easing her tension a little. Her face slid to a relaxed, innocent expression behind the jagged carvings of her mask. Rian's mask was that of a Nekomata, marking her as the animal look-alike for what her body contained. This was meant in defiance, to display her creature as a feared, horrible being, and thus make her one as well. However, Rian was prepared to sacrifice anything the next Shinobi over would, so it hardly mattered. It was just another thing Konoha had done in unmentioned spite of her Biju.

"Tweedledee and Tweedledum?" she asked, looking around and seeing none of her squad members.

Lee chuckled at Rian's code names for Kura and Natto, who were at each other's throats so much that even _he_ could see an attraction forming.

"Scoping out the right side." he informed. The leader of the squad nodded, decisively cupping one hand under her chin.

Lee could see, even in the darkness, why she had done so. Rian's chin was quivering, her mouth pinched in a way that resembled an orangutan's with anxiety. As her husband, he knew this idiosyncrasy impended that Rian was keeping a secret from him. She usually told him everything, but when she didn't, he knew it was a big secret.

A big, juicy secret.

"Rian."

Addressed neko child turned to Lee with wide, concerned eyes. Yeah, it was something huge, he could tell.

"Can I have a kiss?" he asked innocently, his tone smug.

Rian shook her head furiously, and turned back to head-spotting her squad. Her shoulders were hunched to her ears, which Lee recognized from their teenage years. Yep. Humongous.

He scooted closer to Rian, and snaked one arm across the small of her back. Another great thing about being lovers was you knew how to press each other's buttons. Rian would be singing like a canary in a few seconds.

"Oh, come on. Please? What if this is our last mission together?" he shamed, tone pleading as he leaned his head into the crook of her neck. Nuzzling his face, he grinned evilly for a moment when a shudder rippled up Rian's body. Triumph

"You know it won't be, Lee, now get out of my personal bubble." she hissed. Rian was beyond feeling irritated. Now, she was just blindly furious. She knew by Lee's actions that he was either being impersonated by an enemy or knew something and was trying to get a confession out of her.

Her stomach squelched. He knew-

"Please?" She could feel him snuffling into the skin of her neck, nudging her mask aside. Good, night, he was being a horned toad. She shivered when a wet tongue trailed up the side of her face.

"Just one. Please?" he pressed, pulling her the smallest bit closer.

It took every fiber of Rian's willpower to not look her husband in the eyes. She knew that if she did, her resistance would turn to marmalade. Of all the weaknesses Rian had, none was greater than her inability to resist Lee's huge, shining sable eyes.

And she needed to keep this a secret.

Surprised that he was encountering resistance, Lee reached up and hooked her opposite shoulder. Did she think he hadn't heard the noises she had made when she was gagging over in the bushes?

Lee was either being underestimated, or Rian was hiding something.

"Please?" he purred, trying to imitate that throaty tone that he knew drove her absolutely insane.

And that did it. Bedroom voice had always gotten Lee exactly what he asked for, too. Rian gave in, turning her head and pushing her mask up her face before pressing a barely-there kiss directly on his lips. She prayed Lee was stupider than he was acting and wouldn't make the connection-

"AHA!" he screamed, jabbing his finger into Rian's flat chest. Owner of said chest groaned, catching her balance before she fell from the leaf bed they were perched in.

"You threw up!" Lee smiled, as though he had discovered a cure for the cold. The taste of Rian's vomit was sweet and sickening on his lips, lingering for a second before being washed away by his tongue.

Rian eyed him in disbelief, her expression one of pure horror. Would he bridge the events? How long had he been suspecting something? She really hadn't wanted to tell him on the mission field. She had imagined snuggled up on the couch together, or eating microwave ramen, the only thing Rian could cook that didn't taste like charcoal once it was "done".

"Why?" he asked slyly.

Rian's mouth parted, her eyes desperate. She couldn't tell him now. What would he say? They had a mission to complete, and she wasn't going to let something that wouldn't happen for months affect his or her judgment.

Suddenly, a high pitched scream emanated from where the other half of Squad 19 had been stationed. The bushes rustled with the sound of knives to skin and metal on metal, before a deafening boom sounded through the forest as one of Kura's air jutsus exploded full-force, rings of slicing wind flying outwards, mimicking the shock waves of an explosion.

Lee and Rian, minds racing, immediately recognized the technique as one of Kura's strongest and deadliest. She would only use such a jutsu if her team was in true danger-

The call to munitions had sounded. Two flashes became nearly one arrow of blurred white and black as the newlyweds shot toward their team, all marital tension forgotten. Shinobi duty came before their personal matters, but never before their affections.

When Rian hit the ground at a crouch, Sanken blades already jutting from her knuckles and icily pleading for sation of blood, her last clear thought was that she would tell Lee later.

She wouldn't get the chance to.

Deep within her, a saffron eye slid open in a crazed smirk, before a haunting lullaby began to rattle like bones in a skeleton in an eerie melody.

- And as they walked through the valley that a General shuns-

Behind a sealed cage door in her mind, a great form that shone purple behind the straight bars of his prison lumbered to his four, clawed feet. Whiskers twitching and mustard-colored eyes narrowed, the cat's lips curled into a larger, more demented smirk, before they opened once more to continue his call to arms to an army that didn't exist.

Four thousand men laid down four thousand guns..

Being in somebody else's mind for seventeen years could drive you a little crazy.

And Neko-Chan was already insane to begin with.

**A/N: Review, my beloved readers. And, I am sorry for the delay in updating...**


	3. Opening Moves

**Author's Note: .. I'm depressed. -melts into puddle of sad, hormonal goo-**

**My best friend had to move back to Italy with his fat, pimp of a father, and I'm going all paranoid worrying about him. Second, I owe 50,000 coins on Naruto: Gekitou Ninja Taisen 2. I have collected the great sum of 3,500. And last but not least, my mom is sick. Which means I  shall soon be sick. Bleck. **

**Yes, I know you all don't really want to listen to my jabbering. Read, my beloved reviewers. And send me positive comments, please? Say something nice, or I shall turn an adorable, little kitten into a puddle of kitty jelly. Writing for three days straight (up to Chapter 6) has me zonked and angsting, but you all can expect faster updates on the next two chappies, on the up side.**

Rian carried a resentment against Uzumaki Naruto that had begun when she was fourteen. She saw him fight using the Kyuubi chakra once, and had been crazily jealous since than.

It burned being hated and unwanted for being a Jinchuuriki, but it scalded her more that she had this power within her and she couldn't use it.

The reason was, the danger of Neko-Chan, now known as the Nibi, was the most intelligent of the Biju. He had learned a sealing technique that had gotten him into Rian's mind in the first place, and had somehow found the same unsealing technique that had loosed him. Bending Rian to his will had been a feat of manipulation in itself, requiring time and patience, let alone teaching her the art of Sanken and keeping his flame of existence hidden from even the Byakugan, which could see into the chakra system.

However, even though Neko-Chan's chakra was circulating in Rian's Keirukuki, drawing up the dark energy could give the neko a hinge, a handhold. Neko-Chan wasn't talking, so nobody knew how much of a grasp he needed to take over Rian's small body once again. Any use of the Nibi's chakra could be enough, due to the various sealing processes he had used or had used on him, might be just enough for him to regain control, flood Rian's body, and make it his projector once more. Therefore, Rian couldn't use Neko-Chan's energy, for fear that the Nekomata could escape the seal within her mind and wreak untold damage on what was closest.

Tsunade had admonished her to call upon the energy only in countries they were at war with.

For the most part, Rian used only her own chakra, and was unschooled even in how to draw the energy in the first place.

So, despite having the power, Rian couldn't utilize it. This made her dubious each time she saw Naruto, who was very proficient at summoning Kyuubi's chakra, skirmish with the energy of the Fox.

The only perk of being the container of the cat was she was called upon to do only a few seduction missions. The first time she had been called upon for one, Lee had followed her and murdered the man the first move he made at his beloved girlfriend. Lee had nearly blown up the alley they had been standing in with all of the explosive tags had had attached to a handful of kunai. Filled with flaming knives that sparked in the night, the Nuke-nin was dead even before his body was blown to a mere mark on the asphalt. Rian had than had to put up with Lee following her around for three days, and had woken up every night to find that he had somehow wriggled his way from the couch he had made up for himself and was snuggling her like an oversized teddy bear, legs entwined and drooling on her face.

Lee tacked the ground a second before his wife, who was regaining her balance when he was bouncing onto his feet. Rian was slow tonight. He wondered if this had anything to do with her having vomited just before-

With no further thought of it, the Green Beast bounded through the bushes where Kura, Natto, and Sachi had been sent. Rian's steady footfalls behind him calmed what of his nerves weren't being electrically shocked with adrenaline. Together, they exploded through the leaves to face a than-unknown enemy.

They would wish they hadn't.

Natto's lifeless body slumped to the ground, sliding from the three-spiked scythe impaled through his chest. Slick blood painted the shining blades as they glowed in the moonlight, a red rain of crimson dripping from their tips as the Chuunin dropped into a lifeless heap before the red-eyed assassin.

From where she was positioned in front of a thick tree trunk, Kura lunged at the man, snarling and screeching like a wounded animal. Handcuffs made of glowing chakra energy tied around the base of the towering evergreen prevented her from going any farther than her already-broken arms would bend. The bondage was fricasseeing her wrists every time she pulled and resisted it, filling the air with the pungent smell of burning skin. Kura was too blinded by rage to care, forcing herself to ignore the pain and feed the fire burning within her eyes instead. She was coated in blood, either her own or of her teammates, Lee and Rian couldn't gather. Sachi was nowhere in sight, but almost as an afterthought, both of the untouched partners checked her name on their mental list of this mission's casualties.

The kunoichi howled again, just as the white-haired man dulelly noted the expressions on Rian and Lee's collective faces as their expressions went slack-jawed with shock.

What struck them the most wasn't the red eyes devoid of the Sharingan tomes that would have frightened them, or the fact that it had taken this man less than a half a minute to dispose of half their team.

It was the billowing, cloud patterned cape of black and blood-red that stood out in the near-midnight darkness, misshaping the gray haired scythe-wielder.

Akatsuki.

"Well, hello there." came a silvery, sickeningly sweet voice that dripped of sarcasm. The grin that came across his face was devious in it's own form, honey-sweet with the aged folds of his face.

"My, what a favor you've done me." he continued. Rian and Lee simply stared, heads buzzing with the attacks they would use, the loss of Natto, what had become of Sachi, how they could complete his mission without dying themselves, what Akatsuki was doing within the borders of Konohagakure- so many thoughts flooded their thinking at once, ninja instincts setting in as a programmed mode. Calm coolness took over. Getting excited and flighty could result in a fatal mistake. Eyes narrowed in disgust, they simultaneously began to mentally map their attack patterns, based on the weak points of the monologing black-caped man.

"You did me the service of ridding me of my troublesome partner. You don't know how long I've been listening to his miserly soliloquies. I was three steps away from doing the deed myself, but your team has saved me the trouble."

The dead form of Kakuzu was slung limply over a branch, his spine broken in two against the wood by the force of Kura's first Suna jutsu. His Akatsuki cape fluttered at the edges in a gust of a biting breeze that dared brush through the carnal instant, his ash-white unmoving body groaning forward from the squall.

"I have your little desert flower here to thank for that." the twitching smirk replied, mockingly in note of Lee's balance shifting forward the slightest inch.

In a flash, the top blade of his sickle was positioned under Kura's bared neck. The kunoichi gasped, daring not move as the metal pressed against the soft flesh of her throat.

Lee's eyes widened as he froze in place. The odds were already out of he and his wife's league. Another teammate dead wouldn't help even the score, either. They had no idea what this member of the highly esteemed and widely-feared organization's skills were, or where his weak points were.

Without even laying eyes on her, Lee could see the gears in Rian's brain turning. They needed a distraction, and her ninjutsu abilities would have to cover them both.

"Oh, no!" Hidan gasped sardonically, his face mimicking pleasure.

"A step and the little bitch gets it." he continued in a sing-song tone. He was clearly enjoying taunting in his childish way the three live members of the Leaf nin. This only further led Lee and Rian to believe Sachi was dead, which was of little importance at the moment. Bodies could be recovered at the mission's end.

"Hmm, hm, hm…" the white haired Missing-nin chanted, pressing the blade a bit more to the skin of Kura's throat. Oh, this was so much fun. He hardly ever got to masochistically take pleasure from having his enemies at his whim. Hidan thought that while he was facing a cell as weak as this, he might as well have his fun. As long as he killed them all, he was fulfilling his religious duties.

And they had just tried a pretty stupid escape.

Hidan slashed his blade across Kura's throat just as the bunshins of Lee and Rian disappeared into thin air. Blood sprayed the grass as the Suna Shinobi slumped forward at the waist, gagging and vomiting her own life.

Rian and Lee leapt from where they had truly been concealed, the leaves daring whisper as they rocketed toward the Akatsuki member's unprotected behind. A Konoha Senpuu and one Sanken ninjutsu attack were being summoned up as the space between a whirling Hidan and the couple's nimble feet narrowed.

Lee hit the ground on his hands, flipping over himself to pile-drive his feet into Hidan's face. The grinning Akatsuki colleague blocked with the side of his arm, deflecting Lee's flying sandals. While Hidan spun to deflect Rian from where she was balancing on the edge of his scythe, Lee swung down, snatched the man's ankles in his hands, and gave a jerk forward. Unprepared for the height of Lee's taijutsu skills, Hidan was left confused as his feet shot out from under him.

The Leaf Taijutsu master's knee shot upwards as Lee flipped backwards, slamming Hidan in the small of his back. The white-haired man was tossed over Lee, swiping agilely at the Leaf Shinobi with his sickle as the Anbu rolled into a tight ball and somersaulted out of range of attack. Rolling to his feet, Lee was up and brandishing an attack stance in moments.

This was Akatsuki, so he wasn't surprised when Hidan's Kage Bunshin vanished into a cloud of smoke.

The real Hidan, who had been trying to escape through the bushes, was caught by the girl behind the Nekomata Anbu mask in a barely broken clearing where the canopy of branches let the moonlight simper through. A split-second stand-off resulted as Hidan skidded to a stand still, and the heaving Leaf Chuunin glared challengingly through her blank, tunneling eye slats.

In less than a second, Rian completed a series of hand seals. Three Kage Bunshin burst into existence on either side of the slight Black Op, all equipped with blades of feral Sanken style.

"Oh, come now. A few measly Kage Bunshin? I may be the slowest member of the Akatsuki, but I'm not that pathetic." Hidan hissed, smiling sardonically.

Smirking at what she might attempt, the real Hidan slid his scythe in front of his cape-clad body in a "Bring It" stance. His eyes narrowed in what challenge the Jinchuuriki could possess. The child couldn't defeat a member of such an organization as the notorious Akatsuki with a mere show of brandished blades and some fancy footwork. No, this would be a preferably easy kill. His face folded into a scowl- Well, he couldn't really kill the girl. He would just have to exhaust her until he could simply carry her back to his organization's headquarters. After all, this Jinchuuriki was one of the weakest that Akatsuki had taken upon themselves to capture, according to Rian's records. Her taijutsu, though impressive, and her mastery of the forgotten style of Sanken were hardly enough to combat the likes of Hidan, the weakest member of the group.

Hidan was unschooled in the ferocity of Blood Fist.

All at once, the clones burst from view, their teleportation mimicking that of a duplicate bursting from existence. Hidan sneered, shadows playing across his half-hidden expression. The Nekomata hardly had the chakra to keep together a few Shadow Clones. This wouldn't take long at all.

Little did he know that underestimating the Leaf Chuunin would be a fatal error.

For both of them.

Running blindly towards Hidan, Rian smiled underneath her mask. Exactly as she thought. There was obviously a stupid branch of this organization. Shinobi Rule #32; Never underestimate your opponent.

Scowling, Hidan slashed his blades in front of him as the space between his target and himself began to grow smaller. Dumb kid. She would run right into the-

Rian disappeared from in front of the Akatsuki member, leaving no trace of smoke or customary signs of teleportation.

Hidan's sickle lowered from the front of his body, as he glanced around in confusion and expectation. It was as though she had vanished into thin air.

Eyes wide and guard aroused, Hidan tried to train his ears to discovering her location. Surely she couldn't have just materialized, or something like that. That was humanly, even Shinobi-wise, impossible. But, there wasn't a sign of her, either visual or audible. No trace of her in the air, or even under the ground.

He couldn't hear footsteps, or bodies rustling in the bushes. There wasn't a movement from the wind-rustled trees above, and he couldn't hear if she was using a Henge to mimic his surroundings. It wasn't a genjutsu, or he would sense it.

Wrinkling his nose, the man looked toward the dark, looming forest with visible disgust, shivering detachedly in the nippy Autumn air. It was obviously some low, improvised, underhanded trick, which in any other case than being used against him he might have approved of. But right about than, her magic trick was quite annoying. He had much better things to do than play Hide and Seek with the container of a Biju he was supposed to capture. There were much better things to do, and he still wasn't provoked enough to induce his "Wrath" technique. He would catch the woman at little exertion, he was sure.

Akatsuki had given Hidan a big head, insinuating that he himself could simply capture Rian without some interference from the person who loved Rian most in the world.

Such abominable grandiosity could only lead to failure of the acutest kind.

All of the sudden, Hidan was thrown forward, a steely, searing pain piercing the small of his back as Lee launched Rian like a projectile missile at his unguarded rear. Leaving a trench in the ground from the friction of his Shomon-fueled feet, Lee tore a path past their enemy, sending debris and entire chunks of earth scattering into the air. The Taijutsu master disappeared with a crackling trail of chakra in his wake into the winding shadows of the tree maze that enclosed their electric battle as Hidan pitched forward, Rian's Sanken claws piercing his spinal cord.

It was a relatively simple plan of attack, once one thought about it. In a joint attack the couple had developed, Lee would induce the opening of the Fourth Inner Gate while Rian distracted the enemy with a show of a few Bunshin. Keeping the opponent's attention allowed enough time for Lee to compose control over his flaming body, and for him to stabilize his power limit until he could properly bring himself to fly faster than the human eye could follow towards their diversion.

And in a motley fashion, Lee would zoom by and snatch Rian into his time stream, seemingly causing her to disappear from the path of the attacker as the Jounin flashed quicker than the brain could adequately comprehend. Running a wide circle to arc directly behind their opponent, the contact of his feet against the ground wearing a rut and a wake behind the two, Lee would shoot Rian, Sanken claws bared, in the overhand, spinning fashion that one might throw a football. This technique was deathly accurate, with Lee's speed watching their backs and Rian slicing like a knife blade through the enemy's defense to deliver the crushing blow.

Hidan's arms flew behind him to retract the knives from his back, where inches separated blood-hungry steel and the soft, durable material of his spine. He caught Rian by the wrist and jerked, ripping her from his body and over his shoulder, spiking her into the ground on her back, cape blowing forward with the movement.

Twisting her feet under her with the amazing agility that she had trained half of her life for, Rian snatched Hidan's wrist, in turn, and flung herself back on him, using his arms as a bar from which to swing a kick at the man's torso. Blades flying, she landed her foot with every inch of force in her small body to Hidan's chest, pushing off of the man and flipping to a crouch on the ground.

Barely affected, the chain around Hidan's wrist seized as, with a roar, he ripped his arm forward, sending his three-bladed scythe in a spinning fashion directly at the whites of Rian's terror-wide eyes. She was less than two feet away. If Hidan's aim was that bad-

Hidan's scythe imbedded it's first two razor-sharp daggers into the grass with the ease of a knife through butter as Rian materialized using a chakra teleportation. But, Hidan was already tracking her energy signature, so when she reappeared at the Akatsuki member's back, he was prepared for her.

Spinning, he yanked his wrist and sent his scythe flying through the air towards the Chuunin speedster, who was using puffs of chakra to materialize her out of the way of Hidan's attacks. Grass whirled up in a cascading tornado around the two, the crumbling, browned foliage being ripped from it's roots by twists of sandals and hot-coal-dancer footwork.

Intensity climaxed as the two continued to dance and sway out of the way of each other's attacks. Orgasmic bloodlust curdled in Rian's stomach, hungry to be sated, be through. Locked in combat, her blades flailed and sliced at Hidan when she was able to appear near his body for attack, barely nicking his flesh as she swept and dove, twisting and snatching at the man's body to skid out of the way of his attacks.

Eyes narrowed behind the brim of his high collar, the sweating, winded man caught a flying kick to his face with the front of his wrist, skin smarting from impact. He couldn't kill the girl, per the Leader's instruction, which would have been much more fulfilling to his religious duty. He hoped the gods could forgive him for rebelling against their commandments, but this was his life, and to reach a Nirvana of power, he needed to recover this Nekomata alive.

At long last, a slap of contact broke the electric atmosphere of the prevaricating fight. Hidan caught Rian's fist in the palm of his hand mid-punch. A gust of breath kept the metronome of Rian's heart as it pulsed once with surprise, Hidan's fingers wrapping around her suddenly small hand with undeniable intention.

"I don't believe we've been formally introduced, my lady." Hidan said, his tone mocking cordiality.

Rian gave a sharp cry as Hidan cracked her wrist backward until her knuckles touched her arm. A small pop accompanied the snap of the bone, and in seconds Rian's entire right arm was alive with white-hot pain, clawing at her ability to focus under the pressure.

Somehow, though, she managed to keep glaring and huffing through a half-closed mouth, licking crimson from the corner of her lip and keeping slanted olive orbs to Hidan's sarcastic face. She wouldn't let on to anything, or give this man an inkling of what he wanted. With or without a legendary beast, Konoha Shinobi were stronger of will than any breed of nin.

The indigo night settling all around them was suddenly just there, a backdrop to a scene where the action was focused to the characters and the extras and costumes suddenly fade away, riveting your attention to only the pageantry of two becomparisoned actors so enveloped in their roles that they become the only things on the stage to those watching their drama.

"My name is Hidan, fair maiden. And I am your own personal Grimm Reaper." he informed, his voice sugary-sweet, as though he were speaking to a small child or a puppy.

The nin slapped the bottom of Rian's chin with chakra-endowed force, sending her skull cracking backwards and vertebrae close to the point of shattering from the pressure of her skull suddenly pressing back on them.

Rian stumbled backwards, only to be caught by one of Hidan's arms snaking around her back. The leering Nuke-nin continued to smile as he pulled Rian's weakening form a little closer to him, with all the ease of the most experienced tango partner.

Weak and heaving for breath in his arm, Rian had expended almost all her chakra. Standing up would become an issue within moments, and anything tricky enough to escape Hidan's clutches now would have to be a ninjutsu. Rian didn't the energy to fight back or resist. Hidan could soon do with her what he pleased- And he might even have a little extra 'fun' with this one. It wasn't everyday he had a helpless and oh-so-conveniently good looking woman in his grip.

Leaning forward, he brought his mouth to a mere whisper's point from the curling strands of hair that had never grown long enough to tuck in hiate ate's tie, and let a ghosting breath make her shudder against him before he came up with yet-another slithery battle line.

"You know why I've come, and what I've come for. Now, you can come along quietly, or you can fight me and, well- maybe I'll take a little more than your bakemono."

Rian's eyes shot open as Hidan's throaty chortle huffed against the skin of her neck. She felt the kunai whip against her stomach, pressing tightly against the tautening skin of her abdomen.

Hidan couldn't possibly know her secret- She hadn't even begun to show yet. But, still, that one small threat was enough to send Rian into the throes of panic, and suddenly her muscles swelled with a new kind of strength.

With a snarl, Rian reached up and snatched Hidan's stomach in her hands, twisting her hands in the flesh until the man drew a breath in to spread over the pain.

"Oh, my." he sighed at the weak attempt at escape. "Dearie, you need to get this through your monster-tainted mind. I am leaving this forest with you, and you can do it the easy way, or we can-"

At that moment, Hidan shot from her grip, a blue sandal surrounded with white and purple chakra positioned under his face sending the man flying straight into the air with blood ejecting from his mouth and nose.

Lee was on the ground and off it in less than a second, hovering for a Kage Buyo and snaring Hidan in his bandages in little more than a flash barely visible to the human eye. The scream of energy funneling around his body was deafening, but above all else was heard his roar of anger as he flickered, stretched out beneath Hidan's stunned and bleeding form as they hovered above the ground for a moment in time.

The Lotus had been forever branded in Lee's muscle memory, and it was still his signature attack after nearly ten years of learning many more powerful taijutsu techniques. Given, he could open seven gates at his current age, instead of his teenaged limit of five, and he frequently employed this ability to force open more powerful Gates for newer and deadlier versions of the Lotus. The power was like a drug; it had started out as a way to become stronger, to protect his Precious People, to make Gai-sensei proud. Learning the dance of the Renge was the way that Lee could prove himself to everyone, to fight for the right to live in a world of Shinobi who looked down their noses at him. Blowing all those snooty, gifted people away had been more of a thrill than learning to run over water, and the rush of power flooding his body, like a lover's touch, was so amazing, so tantalizingly pleasurable, so enlightening, so, so everything.

He told himself that it wasn't a matter of egotism. It was a matter of his self-esteem, and the way he saw himself when he looked in the mirror. So, he needed something to be proud of about himself, he figured.

Pride always cometh before a fall.

Locking his arms around Hidan's bandage-bound body, the Jounin let the rush of gravity drag him downwards as his innards stayed up. The orgasmic, corporeal tang of pleasure he got when the body of his enemies cracked against his chest with a hopeless spiral toward their death was an affirmation of his belief in himself. Anyone that dared challenge Rock Lee, or his loved ones, would meet their demise by the brunt power of the same failure they had criticized as a child.

Falling, falling, spinning a butterfly dance towards death, Lee whirled his and Hidan's conjoined forms into a terminal-velocity spiral towards unforgiving terra firma. The color of the ground bled into a messy, earth-toned water color from their lines of vision as sheets of dust began to whirl up, the air swirling a fanfare in preparation for their impact.

Anbu mask long demolished from friction, Lee's clenched expression as he threw them downwards was exposed, and perhaps that is how Rian met her end.

Hidan's head twisted to the side, the profile of one side of his face luminescent in the fingernail scrap of a dying moon above them. His head was pressed to Lee's chest from the intensity of their dive, his face inches from the Konoha nin's own. In any case, the blurring of what might have been described as colors around their private moment before they struck the ground made it nearly impossible for them to see anything but each other in the last seconds of Hidan's life.

Attention focused, Hidan deliberately smirked, his eyes reveling in smug triumph.

Growling at the threat, Lee jerked himself to the side, spinning them faster towards the earth. Any escape would be impossible, and impact was ticking away in milliseconds.

Teeth gritted, Lee returned Hidan's expression with a wild smirk all his own. Nobody, _nobody_, threatened him or his family. Especially not Rian.

Unfortunately, a split second before the ground rocked with the force of an Initial Lotus, Hidan's body materialized, his smiling, rubicund eyes and ineligible simper of a leer flickering for a moment-

Before it was replaced with the horrified expression of Rian's.

* * *

Sakura was the first medic to bound over the front desk from where she had been chattering to Shizune when the first hollers for help rang up the foyer of Konoha Hospital.

Natto had burst through the doors first, Sachi feeding him a vein of her chakra to keep the wobbling, trembling man from pitching forward. Laid limply on his back was the body of his former Sand teammate, Kura. A tourniquet of the girl's Konoha hiate ate was tied around her jugular, rendering her unconscious, but only alive through Sachi's other hand, which was flowing with energy to keep the slit in her throat closed. Mercifully, Hidan's blades hadn't cut her head completely off, hopefully missing her vital spinal cord and brain stem. Once Natto had been yanked from between the jaws of death by Sachi chakra-shocking his heart, he had foremost heaved the girl onto his back and carried her the remaining kilometers back to Konoha. Thank God for Sachi. The bratty teenager had been worth her weight in diamonds today. Three lives had already been saved due to hers and hers alone abilities and quick thinking. She had masked her chakra signature and lain on the forest floor, playing dead until she knew the danger had been repelled. For once, she had shown some battle sense; she knew that with her inability to fight, she would easily have been another hitch, and the freak skirmish might not have ended as successfully as it did with her getting in the way of jutsus and sneak attacks.

It had happened. Cell 19 had managed to come together in the true Shinobi way, albeit on the road home to their village. They had finally seen past each other's differences enough to become a true ninja team. Sacrificing each other's comfort and energy for their teammates. If Lee wasn't half-dead, he would have congratulated them. But, as the situation stood, any celebrating would have to be set aside for a later time.

Shizune led Cell nineteen's kunoichi and Shinobi away, while Sakura was left to address the next pair of dead and dying teammates as their forms approached the automatic doors.

When the doors did slide open, Sakura's heart fell into her stomach, and her stomach fell into her shoes. A small gasp caught in her throat, a filligree display of the terror running through her as her jade eyes riveted to the sight before her.

Lee heaved himself over the threshold of the Hospital door, scattering leaves and splattering a mélange of blood and mud onto the linoleum floor, before falling on his knees at her feet, his burden too much for his weakened body.

Being limply carried as gently as the man could manage, what Sakura immediately recognized as his wife, Rian's, bloodied body was draped over his dark-red-saturated arms. Blood plittered steadily down from where her red-crusted Anbu mask was pulled over her broken skull and bloody face, leaving a pool on the tile. Lee's shoulders heaved as he tried to gasp in enough breath to speak, to utter his desperate sentence to the young woman who he trusted more than anyone with his wife.

"He-help her, Sakura." he pleaded, voice squeaking and rasping in turn as his dry throat tried to repress his words. Tongue lolling out, bitten and bloody, Lee panted in recovery of his mad tear toward the gates of Konoha. His body was severely weakened by his Initial Lotus, but somehow, he had persevered, reliving the first of the two times he had, fueled by panic, dragged Rian back towards help when she couldn't herself.

Sakura fell to her knees, ignoring the burn of her skin sliding raw against the plastic. Her experienced hands shot to Rian's neck, groping for a pulse through her smoke-colored turtleneck beneath her white chest plate.

"Lee, what happened?" she cried, unable to keep the panic from her voice. She and Rian had never been friends, always being detachedly cordial to each other, but never drawing their relationship any further. Sakura simply had better friends to worry about, and Rian had an obvious distaste for the pink-haired medic. Years had passed since their childhood dislike for each other, but Sakura had never been fond of the rough-around-the-edges and Jinchuuriki Rian, and Rian held a grudge over the way Sakura had treated Lee when they were mere teenagers. Still, Sakura had become more fond of Lee over the years, and she knew it would more than kill him to lose her. Rian was the bane of his existence. For her to die would be to lose not only her, but one Shinobi named Rock Lee.

Lee swallowed hard, unable to choke out the words in his dry throat. Exhaustion, coupled with the complete panic he was feeling, would make talking impossible. His thoughts were racing too fast to understand, but there was one major thing that stood out amidst the chaotic sea of horrific emotions swirling within him.

"I-I, he switched them- He put her, in my arms- just before we- I- we hit the ground, so fast- There was nothing I could- I used the Lotus on her, instead, and- And I killed her!"  
Saying the words aloud made him wretch, bile burning the back of his throat. He'd killed her.

Hidan had somehow switched their places, replacing Rian with himself instants before Lee would have the man's spine with a crushing blow to the forest floor. The man had slumped over instants later, dead from spinal injuries, or blood loss- or, Lee didn't know. All he knew was it was Rian he had slammed into the ground, headfirst. It was the nearest person to him that was lying dead in his arms.

Shuddering, eyes wide with panic, there was nothing in the moment but Lee on his knees on a Hospital floor, thoughts bleeding in a macabre curtain that overrode every sense of decorum or ability to think clearly.

He prayed a thousand times in a matter of moments for his wife, his lover, his, his- his everything. He begged God for her to just breathe, for her chest to heave with a filigree breath. The floor was buckling under Lee's feet, and he didn't know what to do, how to act, or even how to remember what it was like to think. He begged the Lord to exchange his life for hers. But, could he be forgiven for this, this horrible crime- Would God even listen to him after he'd murdered his wife in cold blood?

He'd killed her. Hissing accusations began to fill the empty panic, making Lee's brain swell to accommodate the horrific realization. The feeling of impact, Rian screaming, the sickening crack of her bones as they slammed headfirst into the ground all replayed in his mind again and again. His knees wobbled under the weight on his spine-splintered back as everything shattered around him.

"I KILLED HER!" he screamed, trying to tear the guilt from his heart as unheeded tears tore their way down his cheeks. Rian's lifeless body made no reaction to the outburst, even when Lee lurched forward over her, vomit exploding from his mouth and splattering the light-blue flecked floor beneath them.

Sobbing, he tucked his head to her flat chest, begging, pleading, gasping for one chance, one breath, just in case there was just one left. She had to know, she had to know. He hadn't meant it. It, it was an accident.

He loved her more than anything on God's green earth. She had to know that. Did she know that?

Why hadn't he kissed her one more time before they left on their mission? Why hadn't he taken another whiff of her almond-scented hair when they snuggled up on the couch in front of one of their favorite movies? Why hadn't he whispered that he loved her when she was tying her mask on? Why hadn't he, why hadn't he-

In seconds, Rian was pulled from his arms by hands he didn't recognize, and he was left, panting, upright for a few moments. Low voices warbled words that made no sense, all messily bled together and a string of words, sounds, all things Lee forgot and remembered in the space of that couple of moments.

And suddenly, he pitched forward, his Black Op armor clanking as he landed on his chest, his weakened body unable to support his detaching mind and numb limbs.

Sandals thundered toward him, and he caught, in his blurred vision, a medic slinging Rian into his arms and slamming through the double doors that led to the Emergency Room.

"I'm sorry." he mouthed through his cracked, bleeding lips, an moment before the world faded into merciful darkness.

Why hadn't he?

**A/N: The angstleness. Unfortunately, this isn't even the beginning of Rian and Lee's problems. Trust me. Chapter Four is gonna get some of you _crawling down my throat and out my rear end _for what Lee does... **

**Yes. I taunt. Now, review, my subjects.**


	4. Love Me Tender

Author's Note: I'M GETTING A ROCK LEE PLUSHIE FOR CHRISTMAS! -squee-

Agh, Maya. I'm working on your TayuShika. Who knew such crack was so difficult to write? Ah, a fanfic writer's life for me. I love it. :)

I NEED PAIRING REQUESTS FROM BOWSERJR, NAASH, KYIRI MAKRONO, AND KIRA-KIRA-SHILOH! Remember, I promised you all stories, and I'll go through with that promise if it friggin' kills meh. Also, we have some fanart for this story, which is all up on my profile. Check it out, guys!

On a personal note, however. I'm still sick, and cwanky. -swipes at her nose- Review nicely, because, for some reason, my email server is refusing to send me emails from or load AMVs on YouTube. -fires machine gun at a passing Bellsouth truck- I want Road Runner, and I want a pair of Rock Lee cosplay legwarmers. And I want them now...

Yes. Now, enjoy, please. You all being happy will make me happy.

"Hidan and Kakuzu." the black haired man noted dryly, a second before the manila folders slapped the desk in front of his leader.

Sharingan narrowing, the cape-clad man continued to stand at the unflinching form of a shadowy replica of a man slouched over a tabletop, hands knit and fingers resting between his nose and his lip, red eyes riveted to the wall with boredom.

How tedious it was, having to explain everything to a ninja who couldn't see the bigger picture. The Leader sometimes wondered why he kept this worthless statistician around. So what if this man was his most trusted acquaintance, and the most brilliant of his organization's members? In this instance, Uchiha Itachi was proving quite worthless, so far.

Cloak shifting with Itachi's slightest quiver, the elder Uchiha brother continued to drill his eyes into the back of the Leader's head, quietly demanding an explanation. His next sardonic response mocked the very impudence of his Leader's apparently hair brained scheme.

"Both KIA on their mission to retrieve the Nekomata No Nibi." he informed with a lethargic bat of his dandelion-silk eyelashes. He didn't seem bothered at all by the fact that two men he knew were now dead, nor could he be expected to. The thought had never even crossed the Nuke-Nin's mind.

In the Shinobi world, you were born, you followed the path of violence laid prematurely out for you until it killed you, and that was your existence. And if you were excessively lucky, you had a family to mourn you after you were killed in action. Failure was not tolerated well, and weakness not allowed. You died an honorable death protecting your country and beliefs, or you died a coward who was killed too easily.

Thus, Hidan and Kakuzu had no one to mourn them, because they had failed their mission, in an unsaid sense, by dying. No joy or sorrow was to be expressed toward the loss of the pathetic existences had barely aided the organization. At any time, really, emotions just weren't to be openly recognized. And in hardened Shinobi's cases, neither inwardly.

"Either they failed, in which case we have suffered an extreme detriment to our organization's forces, or they were purposely sent out on a mission beyond their skill level to be killed off."

The room was scalded with a throaty laugh and a shake of shoulders from the white robe-clad Leader. So there was hope for Itachi.

Shadowy grey slants of eyes widened enough to gaze seductively at the former Konoha nin, fingers numbly laced at the bridge of his lips and nose.

"I'm as surprised as you will be to hear this, Uchiha, but it appears that I overestimated the strength of our deceased duo."

Itachi seemed neither amused, nor surprised at the revealing of his leader's oversight. Hidan and Kakuzu were the weakest pair in the organization, so it seemed perfectly natural to Itachi for the two to have failed in the retrieval of a Biju. This had been the two's trial run in capturing monsters, their true initiation into the Akatsuki. That they had failed to make the cut and paid with their lives was merely a formality.

"As it stands, two of our members were killed in the retrieval of a Biju and it's Jinchuuriki. We have no monster to show for it, and are now a pair of able hands short in our efforts."

Sitting back, the Leader sighed nearly inaudibly, before once more drawing the breath to continue informing one of his closest confidants of this potentially fatal lapse in assignment.

"-Which is why I am sending my most capable hands out to finish the job that Hidan and Kakuzu so disgustingly left us. You and Kisame are to retrieve the Nekomata No Nibi in a few month's time. As of now, there are several more Biju to be captured, and a new recruit has been selected to replace our lost members. When we do strike Konoha, I would like for it's defenses to be riled enough so that when they do let their guard down, they will be even more venerable than they were before this- deterring factor in our plans."

Itachi's head bobbed, not enough to be considered a nod, but enough to coldly address a Leader who required no respect.

The leader narrowed his shadowy orbs in silent dismissal, sure that Itachi had gotten the message.

"You may go, now. The new member of Akatsuki will be arriving within minutes, I suspect. He's a sleeper agent who defected from the Leaf, so I suppose that gives you two something in common. Go to him."

In a shadowy whisper of his cape, Itachi strode purposefully towards the door that led to the small office the Leader occupied.

The door slammed behind him, and the tacking of Itachi's sandals could be heard tapping around the corner, and out of earshot within moments.

The office was deathly quiet for a few moments after the sounds died out. Dust mites did butterfly dances in the illumination of the single light that cast a circle around the robes hanging over the sides of the Leader's chair. Other than that small ellipse, the room was completely devoid of light, filled with a darkness only evil can procure.

A smile shifted the man's hands as they rested atop his upper lip. His shadowy face curled into a smirk, red eyes gleaming with a sparkle in the corner of his eyes as thoughts of conquest began to bloat his mind with grandiose thoughts.

His eyes shifted to the manila folders between his elbows, eyebrows lowering slightly at the pictures of a stoic Kakuzu and Hidan paper clipped to their records. He'd known that they couldn't handle such a monster, let alone Leaf's two most proficient taijutsu masters. Still, Akatsuki was always three steps ahead of even the most brilliant tactiticians, even of such a powerful country as Konoha.

They'd created a recipe for success, this group. And their success would be conquest of the feudal nations, only to be procured by collecting the most powerful ninja in all of the lands, and combining them with the strongest creatures in their world: The Tailed Beasts.

Two Biju awaited the Akatsuki members who could rise to the occasion. And if anyone could capture the Neko, it would be his trusted right hand, Itachi.

"Consider this a warning, Konoha." he muttered, before violently throwing the folders off of his desk with a swipe of his broad-sleeved hand.

* * *

"Lee, put me down. I'll be fine!"

The Rock's door poked open a sliver, only to have Lee place a sure kick that sent the doorknob imbedding itself into the plaster behind it. Lee edged his way through the doorway, before standing in the center of their messy home.

Three rooms made up the small apartment, one being the grimy bathroom that they never got around to cleaning. The TV's rabbit ears were being supported by a pile of taijutsu scrolls, and every so often one of the naked wires would let out a spark of angry electricity. The blender was, once again, emitting the smell of smoke which, combined with the window cleaner and the frankfurters in the refrigerator which were, like cats, busily marking their territory, made for a rather unpleasant odor that seemed to cling to their clothes no matter how many times they washed them.

"Ah, Home Crap Home." Lee sighed woefully. Despite both of their busy jobs, this torn-down, vandalized apartment was all they could afford without having to borrow money from Tenten and Neji, who were continually trying to cram ryou down their throats. The cabinets were off their hinges, wiring was exposed in the light switches, and some villagers, unhappy with the Nekomata's presence within the confines of their country, had broken in and spray-painted obscenities on the kitchen wall, among robbing the couple of most of their valuables. Rian had taken some leftover purple paint to the curse words, and there was now a block of motley dark magenta over the kitchen counter, adding further to the odd look of their home.

Rian shifted in Lee's arms. She'd been hospitalized for only a few days, retaining only minor injuries to her skull and shoulder from being Lotus-ed into the ground. Lee, in desperation, had somehow managed to short out his third gate, therefore easing the strain at which she struck the forest floor. That reflex had probably saved her life, she had been told.

Other than being slightly shaken from her encounter with Akatsuki, Rian had recovered amazingly, even with Lee's tireless paranoia annoying the heck out of her. The man simply did not know when to stop. He'd been in the Hospital 18 hours a day, at least, even falling asleep with his head pillowed on Rian's shoulder, once. He'd looked like a hobo after about three days, in the same rumpled clothes and a beard coming in on his ashen cheeks. The bags underneath his eyes had swelled to the point that he probably could have used them to carry his wallet and keys in, too. Rian had barricaded her hospital room's door when he went on a rare break and, shouting at him through the door, forced him to go home, shave, shower, and eat something other than coffee and sandwiches. Instead, he had gone out and gotten drunk off his rocker on sake, trying to ease the emotional pain he was experiencing.

Rian thought it was the stress that had driven him to drink. For causing him such strife, she was hysterical with sorrow. She felt that, by becoming injured, she'd breached Lee's self-confidence and feeling of security. Curled on a sterile gurney, she'd cried silent tears into her pillow in the darkest part of the night, feeling through synergy that he was in intense pain, and of her infliction.

What she didn't know was that it was the guilt he was harboring against himself that had sent him looking for relief in a cream-colored bottle.

After destroying the pub, he had gone home, broken down the door, and fallen asleep on the suddenly very-empty bed, after sobbing for a total of two minutes before unconsciousness claimed him.

After sleeping off the sake, of course, he was right back at her side, trying to convince her that where they had shaved her head to repair her skull wasn't that visible.

He lied through his teeth.

Rian ended up tying her headband in a cock-eyed position over her head to hide the lack of hair in that spot.

"What are you talking about? This is the greatest home on the planet." Rian said, eyebrows lowering in anger.

Lee gave her a look, upper lip curling up. Maybe Rian _had_ retained some brain damage from being slammed into the ground… This place was a dump, littered with cereal boxes, soda cans, dirty clothes, and tossed-aside couch cushions from their most-recent search for the remote. It turned out to be in the freezer, for those who were wondering.

He felt guilty for living in such a dump. He should have been able to provide something better for his most Precious Person. And besides, Gai-sensei had always put high emphasis on pride. But, as it stood, they had to deal with a broken coffee maker and put Duct Tape over the mouse holes in the walls, no matter how much it burned him to know that he couldn't provide more.

"Oh, please. What on this earth could _possibly_, besides the Mint Chocolate Chip in the freezer, make this place quote 'the greatest home on the planet', unquote?" he asked, waiting amusedly for her answer. He heaved her up a little more to regain his hold on her slight form. Rian probably weighed less than the pack he carried on month-long missions. He didn't know how she managed to stay so thin. It had to be unhealthy. … Although she looked like she had actually gained some weight, as of recently-

Rian glanced up at him from under her bangs, her eyes innocent as she wrapped her arms tighter around his neck.

"Well, for one thing, you're in it."

Lee's eyebrows lowered. He worked his lower lip against his teeth, expression turning to that of gratitude as he felt his heart swell within his chest. In some sick way, he didn't want to believe that she loved him as much as she said she did; couldn't, not after how lacking a person he was. But, of course, he didn't dare speak a word of it. His festering guilt washed from the scarring whip-marks he had clawed into himself for one brief moment.

How did she always manage to know what to say exactly when he needed an ego boost?

He leaned forward and caught a kiss from her scarred lips, tasting the coppery tang of blood on her tongue. She gripped his neck tighter, feeling a wave of contentment wash over her. How many times had she wondered if she'd been able to do this again while she'd been a regular decorated emergency?

Any place on earth was OK with her, as long as Lee was there to hold her, she was convinced.

Breaking for air, Lee smiled demurely at the face inches from his own, spurred by the saccharine smile gracing his wife's countenance. For a blissful moment, there were no head injuries, no missions, no ninja skills or rats disappearing in and out of the walls being chased by boa constrictors. There were just silvery strings of love and lines of lighting that crackled between meetings of lips that held them together.

"Rian, you're, like, killing me. Can I put you down, now?" Lee asked, giving her a wobbly smile. His trembling knees were barely supporting them. Rian really _had_ gained weight-

Eyebrows jumping, Rian hopped down forcefully, almost before Lee was ready to let her go. She twisted, before limping toward the blender, which was shooting out sparks on the countertop. The sink was brimming with dirty dishes, which were sitting in equally-dirty water. Without batting an eye, Rian reached over, jerked the machine's cord from it's socket, and spiked the blender into the basin of water.

The machine sparked angrily, before dying in a flash of yellow sparks.

Lee watched the spectacle with raised eyebrows. Rian was so random, sometimes. She never ceased to amaze him, really. His heart swelled and fluttered as his countenance lit with a smile. He couldn't think of anyone that he loved more than the woman who was beating their obliterated blender with a washcloth.

How an eyebrow-endowed geek with no charm had managed to 'snag a girl' like Rian was beyond his comprehension. To him, she was perfect in every aspect. His earth angel. She deserved so much better than the hot-blooded failure he was.

And he was a failure. He knew that.

Screw Gai-sensei and his 'Believe in yourself!' crap. Lee had almost killed the dearest person to him by letting the enemy slip through a crack in his defenses. He should have known. Should have been one step ahead of Hidan.

A little tug in the corner of his brain reminded him that knowing the techniques of every enemy that Rian and he would come across was virtually impossible.

But, Lee had done impossible things before. His eyes narrowed unconsciously, fingernails digging into the bandages on his hands as his fist clenched with determination. _Never again_, he promised, in the depths of his mind.

Never again will one of my Precious People suffer because of my stupidity.

Rian screeched, and began smashing the blender with her wet cloth with renewed fervor. She'd been excessively moody, lately, and right than she'd decided that she was downright sick of their stupid blender.

She was sick to her stomach, weepy, emotional, angry- and tired of hurting. She was frustrated with Lee for caring so much, and irate to know that he was probably angry at himself, thinking that somehow he could have prevented what had happened to her. She just knew him that way. And the machine of her discontent would be her scapegoat.

The blender was going to die. Tonight.

In a second, Lee had her wrist in mid-whack, his steel vice keeping her from striking the plastic jar in her temperamental anger. He snaked the other arm around her waist, dragging her helpless form backwards until she was pressed against the skin-tight fabric of his jumpsuit.

She could feel the rising and falling of his chest against the back of her neck, the rhythmic sensation making her want to shudder. Seven years later, and sudden touches still frightened her, the memory of Neko-Chan's scoldings for getting too attached to anyone and anything sandblasted into her memory.

It took a few seconds for her to ride out the wave of fear cresting in her stomach, until she could compose herself enough to catch a hitched breath within her throat.

Lee knew something was wrong. Rian was acting so off of her usual self, with irrational mood swings. He could tell it was pure anger coursing through her veins, her pulse throbbing against his chin as he rested it in the crook of her neck. There was something else wrong with her, and he needed to understand. He could help her, but only if she told him what was going on. They both knew that.

But, it just wasn't time to say it, yet. Maybe she'd lose it, or maybe the seal would weaken. A billion maybes crossed her train of thought. She'd wait until it was absolutely certain of this priority-rocking condition before she belayed any sense of this event occurring.

She'd just have to hide her symptoms better, even though she hated the idea of keeping this from him.

She didn't even know how it happened, or why. It was impossible. But, somehow, she'd managed to bend the rules of anatomy. It was so odd, they'd even called Tsunade in to examine the situation. Her call was what they originally suspected.

Rian thought she was keeping something from Lee. Well, Tsunade and Sakura were keeping something even bigger from her.

Lee felt Rian's breathing even out, her tense muscles relaxing as she exhaled the trauma on her mind. That was it. He knew it. She was freaked out and frightened because of what had happened, and it was his fault.

The thought of not only himself, but her being in emotional anguish is what pushed Lee over the brink. He made his decision than.

Rian would never suffer something he could have prevented. With that, he branded the words into his Nindo. Rian was his alone to protect, and he would do his duty 'til death did they part. But, if death did part them, it would not be Rian's that did so.

Rian shoved her husband's arm away, making him inhale at the loss as she limped over to the counter and jerked open a cabinet what she thought was gently. The cabinet door came off in her hand, cracking as the small nails detached itself from the rotten wood of the wall.

"OK. First home improvement: Fix the cabinets." Rian breathed, refraining from turning to face Lee. She wasn't sure of what her expression was, and she wasn't going to take any chance of making him more worried than he already was.

Lee continued to stare blankly at the back of Rian's mussed head of wispy hair. What would he have done if he'd lost her? What if she had been killed by his hands? How could he have dealt with such a loss-

The possibilities were frightening, and some of them weren't even a portion realistic. He knew one thing for absolute certain, though. If Rian died, he would follow her into the darkness.

"Hey."

In the few seconds he had been lost in thought, Rian had clambered to her feet and was giving him a facadic smile. Lee only had to gaze into her eyes to determine the thoughts and gears shifting behind that pleasant mask of a smile she was showing him.

Rian pressed a kiss to the bridge of his unresponsive nose. He continue to stand there, slumped in a defeated position, arms hanging limply at his sides, only wincing when she reached up to brush the shingled bangs from his hollow eyes. She should have known, right than, that something inside of Lee was dead.

With the sickening crack of her own bones in that forest, something inside of him had shattered, too. She had shed more than her own blood. She'd dribbled Lee's life and soul onto that Hospital floor, leaving pieces of a broken heart behind. He didn't blame her for it, of course.

He blamed himself.

"How 'bout if the microwave isn't PMSing, I'll make us some Instant Curry?" Said boxed product was the staple of the Rock diet nowadays, when it wasn't Instant Ramen or rice. It usually put Lee in a good mood, too. He loved curry, even if it was hydrogenated plastic in a box.

She hoped her over-painted smile would convince him to read between the lines, nothing was messed up and everything was alright. He seemed to be studying her countenance with the expression of a zonked-out hobo, grinding his teeth against his lower lip. She knew that play of his facial features, as she knew every one of his idiosyncrasies. It was a gesture of nervousness, or extreme-

Guilt.

"No. I'm good." he said, before brushing past her as though he were no lighter than a ghost. Or maybe Rian was just too numb to feel his arm brush hers, his shoulder sweep against her ear as the depth of Lee's emotional tautness came rushing back like the bursting of a dam.

"I-I'm just gonna go yank out a few of those old training scrolls. Not really hungry tonight-"

His voice trailed off as he disappeared into the hall way, shoes ringing on the wood floor as he strode stiffly toward the box of taijutsu manuals stacked in their room. She knew that stance, too. The Never-Gonna-Give-It-Never-Say-Die-Even-Though-I'm-Doomed stance. The way he squared his shoulders, the way he tucked his hands oh-so-casually into his pockets. The way he tried to mask his anxiety with crisp steps.

The way she could tell his bottom lip was quivering, even when he was turned away from her.

Feeling an awkward sniffle pound for escape against the walls of her mind, Rian swallowed a lump of something in her throat, and squared her shoulders determinedly as she reached for one of the blue boxes stacked unevenly in the cabinet she crouched before.

She didn't know what to cry about, anyway, even if she could.

There was nobody else to drag Lee out of this blue period besides her. He had every right to be frightened of what had happened. But, in the process, she didn't want to lose him to that fear. I mean, she was fine with what had occurred- She told herself it was because she had been expecting it to happen. Akatsuki's intentions were well known, and she and Naruto were both well-informed of the danger their lives were in for containing the monsters.

But- her head tilted downward slightly, her lips pursing morosely.

She didn't want Lee to be in that danger zone.

Something in her stomach curdled, a combination of the life beneath the charcoal tattoo on her belly and the foreboding feeling that she and Lee had just crossed a threshold on the way down.

* * *

Tenten froze as the light switch clicked on, her tongue half-frozen to the spoon she held in front of her face.

"Aha." came Neji's monotone, knife-blade words, followed by a thin smile curling the edges of his lips up seductively.

He'd caught her in the act, this time. Of the mental games Neji and his wife played, this had been a recurring one for the past year or so. She really thought he didn't hear her creeping down those squeaking steps, slapping the walls for the light switch, tripping over the threshold to the living room in the dark, and clanking every bottle in the refrigerator as she searched for her midnight snack? How was a man supposed to get any sleep around here?

Tenten looked guiltily at her concave expression in the spoon, before slurping the last of the vanilla-flavored goodness from the utensil, trying to ignore Neji's smirk as he leaned against the doorframe in silent triumph, arms over his chest and feet crossed.

Released from their usual panda-bear buns atop her head, Tenten's auburn hair fell in a shining curtain well past her shoulders. Her maternity pajamas were straining over the vast expanse that was the third child of their union, and her bare ankles were swollen with the weight of her burden.

But, there was still a strange beauty in this 'Hindenberg' version of his Tenten, Neji thought. (Saying those words aloud would immediately result in having kunai knives jammed down his throat, of course. That was what brains were for.)

A carton of one of those vanilla-swirled flavors that only a pregnant woman would eat was melting on the island of the Hyuuga's kitchen, just soft enough to leave a white residue mustache on Tenten's upper lip. This residue curled up into a small smile as Tenten dunked her spoon into the mushy mound in front of her once more, and popped the spoonful into her mouth. Who cared if Neji knew she was having cravings?

Chocolaty Nirvana made her moan, squelching the melted goop loud enough to make it sound delicious. In seconds, she was crunching on the almond-peanut-God-knew-what-else, enjoying the motley midnight snack and the studying glance of her husband.

With a frown, Neji strode across the light-brown wood of the kitchen floor and stopped on one side of the table. Tenten stopped once more, giving him a questioning look with a bite dangling out of her mouth.

It sometimes unnerved her, the silence that existed between them. Lee was always jabbering to and about Rian every second, and it was obvious the affection the two had for each other. She wondered if Neji's affection was that obvious, sometimes. By nature, Neji was a quiet person, never saying a word unless it would stun an entire room of people. To others, or at least to her when she was but a mere teenager, he came across as a stoic, lead-brained butt hole with a stick up his rear end with a bad attitude about life. His face seemed always caught between smirking sarcasm and despotism, and his body language was one of a spoiled kingpin, always in control and loving every minute of it.

And when Neji wasn't in control, he got cranky. Everyone who knew him knew that. He was a born leader, scorned from the position as a child. Perhaps that was why his unconscious need to control anything and everything was so great.

Tenten sometimes wondered why she had found herself crushing on him in the first place, or why she was currently married to him and bearing his child. Such a bee-in-my-bonnet disposition surely didn't agree with her placid, lazy acceptance of life, penetrated only by the barbs of her determination. She was a caring, loving, maternal type of kunoichi, content to exist under good leadership, but ready to take charge in order to help others. Neji was an intimidating, fierce, and miserly controlling type of man by trait, and he would never lose that sense of himself. When he wanted to, he could be selfish, and downright horrible sometimes.

So, why did she love him so much?

"I want some." Neji said, reaching his hand out into a 'gimmee-gimmee' position to accept the spoon from her.

Tenten glanced down at his hand, before scowling sardonically at her husband.

"No, you awful person. I'm a raging ball of hormones and nerves, and you're not taking away the only thing I love on earth." she spat, earth-colored eyebrows lowering so that she might squint in the "Evil Pregnant Woman"-est way possible.

Neji closed his eyes and huffed a laugh, half-smiling contentedly. They both knew the words were in jest. Neji always had her to fall back on, he knew, even when she was in her current state of pregnancy. Cravings, mood swings, indigestion- they'd done this all before with Ai, and little Kei, their newest. And personally, Neji didn't mind listening to it, or having to drag the children out of the house to protect them from their mother's scalding swear words when an inanimate object angered her. He could put up with the shouting, the complaining, the swelling child in her body that seemed to enjoy kicking Neji through her stomach in the night. No, he could take all of that. He didn't mind at all.

He didn't mind, partially because when Hinata had borne Naruto's first child, she'd been thirty times worse. Though he had never experienced such a phenomenon himself, (Thank God.) Neji knew that pregnancy was, in a word, H-E-double hockey stick, at least for the woman carrying said child. And secondly, he didn't mind because he loved her. And that was that.

Striding across the kitchen, sleep-mussed hair standing up on one side of his head, Neji set to rummaging through the kitchen drawers for a spoon of his own. Tenten's latest fit had sent her obsessively cleaning and reorganizing everything in their once familiar kitchen. He'd been searching for the laundry detergent a while ago, only to discover that it's spot was now being filled with dry cat food: The same was true the time that he'd been groping around for a clean shirt and pulled out one of Tenten's- erm.. 'unmentionables'.

"So, what are you doing up?" he asked, tone oozing with as much sympathy as Neji would allow himself to use. Neji was not an emphatic person, his wife and children being the only ones to wax such reactions from him.

Tenten rolled her eyes, dragging her tongue over the divine mixture of all things women loved.

"_You_ try sleeping with someone sitting on your bladder." she refuted, before stabbing at the now nearly-liquid contents of the Haagen Daaz container.

Neji squared his shoulders, utensil located. No, in fact. That didn't sound very pleasant at all. And in spite of himself, Neji found himself once more feeling his young wife's pain. And remembering how much he loved her.

Striding back across the room with a dignified air, he reached out and calmly took the container from beneath where Tenten was dipping another bite of the chocolaty goo, thinking that his dear, sweet wife would allow him the luxury of a taste of the lip-smacking dessert.

Have you ever tried to get between a pregnant woman and her ice cream?

Tenten crunched the container between both of her hands, effectively gripping the ice cream carton with as much power as a charka-endowed fist.

Face contorting into a snarl, Tenten growled, swiping the other hand back as though to slam a punch directly into her husband's shocked countenance. Bathrobe rustling with her movement, Tenten was a study in off-duty Shinobi. Gritted teeth, murderous expression- flaring hormones that required Chunky Monkey flavored sorbet to sate.

Neji's eyebrows shot up, his expression sliding into a rare look of surprise. He could tell by the look on her face that she was being dead serious- Kami. Pregnant women. All he wanted was a bite! It was her fault for making it sound so good; smackling, licking, crunching, and moaning like it was the greatest food on earth.

"I just want a bite, Tenten." he whispered, using a voice reserved for children and wounded animals in hopes of calming his snorting, snarling lover. Even in her current condition- _especially_ in her current condition, the weapons mistress was still likely to run him down and punch his lights out, even if it was only for a carton of Haagen Daaz. Neji still had a scar from when she'd flung a hair dryer at him during her first pregnancy. Sometimes, it really sucked being married to a hormonal bundle of nerves version of Konoha's undeniable projectiles master. And he wasn't even about to think about the whole "Fling-boiling-hot-soup-on-the-no-good-husband" incident. He couldn't even _begin_ to say, in a K+ Rated fan fiction, how much that had hurt.

Nothing on earth was more frightening than an angry woman who was in the family way. Neji would sooner face the entire Akatsuki on his own, than be reprimanded by his pissy-missy wife for buying the wrong brand of mustard.

All at once, Tenten's weight fell back onto her heels, leaving her swollen form standing directly in front of Neji. Her arms slid back to her sides, bent spoon barely held in her slender fingers. When they were beside each other, Tenten's head barely came to the bottom of Neji's chin. They were almost as out-of-proportioned as Rian and Lee where, in that aspect.

And than, Neji saw it. Tenten's lower lip began to quiver. Her almond eyes grew wide, gaining twelve new chibi shines in each corner. Her body began to shake, and a few hiccups began to mask downright sniffles.

Oh, no. Warning signals began to flash in Neji's brain. He should take cover. Immediately. Hide in the dishwasher. In the cabinet. Under the floorboards. There was an incoming mood swing headed directly his way.

"Fine!"

Neji, who had unconsciously drawn his arms up to shield his face, winced at the word. But, after a few moments of silence, he began to ascertain that perhaps his wife wasn't actually about to beat him to an inch of his life with a crumpled spoon.

He had been standing on one leg, prepared to flee for his life, the ice cream carton raised above his head. Ah, yes. The great Hyuuga Neji, afraid of his own wife. It was pathetic, yes, but a very well-based fear, all the pointy objects around them considered.

Slowly, Neji slid his foot back down until he was adequately balanced in a standing position. Tenten's sardonic eyes were locked to his face the entire time, watching him with mild enthusiasm. Her expression was a taut, lip chewing one, of no mean amount of any emotion, really. She seemed- slightly amused, actually.

He sighed. The Hormone Monster had once again been pushed back into it's prison. It was only a matter of time before it escaped again, but-

Wide, lavender eyes riveted to Tenten, Neji slowly, veeeery slowly, raised a spoonful of the ice cream to his lips, ready to bolt if she was kidding with him. Trepidation was required with women, he'd learned. Even when one said 'yes', they might not mean it. These lessons were especially important to remember when one was blaming you for their current state of obesity.

They were a special race, the female human, and sometimes he wondered if it was all really worth the trouble.

But, he only had to feel the pressure of two plump lips on the bridge of his nose, or see two heads of chocolate brown hair racing toward him when he came home from a long mission, and he remembered it was more than worth it.

Being a father had mellowed Neji out a bit, he would be rather reluctant to admit. But, it was a good kind of mellow. The kind that let him feel completely unashamed when he found himself talking to Kei in the grocery store, and the kind that kept him from tearing Tenten's head off when she was PMSing.

For once in his life, Neji didn't care about being the head of the Clan, being the best, the strongest, or the avenger. There was something more important than any of his childhood dreams, more to life than what he had lived. It was called, a family of his own.

And as far as he was concerned, he'd drop any of those Shinobi dreams in a heartbeat for this one.

"-Fine, that is, if you can take the guilt." Tenten added, almost as an afterthought.

Cold metal spoon halfway to his lips, Neji paused. There was definitely an undercurrent of something smart in her tone. Eyes imploring, he raised a thin, smoke-colored eyebrow in question.

Wide eyed, Tenten gazed with genuine disbelief into the Hyuuga's periwinkle orbs, her small mouth falling open in mock astonishment.

"You'd actually take food from your own baby?" she asked, sounding absolutely flabbergasted.

The kitchen was silent for a moment, before Neji shoved the container into her chest, looking away and scowling.

That was a low blow: using his own offspring against him like that. Too low. Only a barbed, grandiose woman half-high on estrogen and chocolate would say such a thing to the husband that had ran down to the Grocery in the wee hours of the night to get her Ranch flavored Doritos.

He was about to say these words aloud, but thought the better of them. What point would they make?

"Thank you." came a fluttery voice as Tenten poked him in the back of the head with her spoon, before flightily taking a scoopful of the melange for herself. Giggling like a schoolgirl, she twirled towards the kitchen door and tried to whisk herself down the hallway with all the superior condescension of a debutante. Unfortunately, with ten pounds of baby hanging over her pajama pants, that was rather difficult to accomplish. Actually, Neji thought, she looked more like a semi turning an intersection on the highway.

Mellow, his foot. He was gonna go catch her and tickle her until she apologized.

It was kind of sad to think that both of these relationships would be destroyed just because of one miscommunication between Rian and the man she'd sworn to love for the rest of her life, no?

A/N: TEASER! Well, I guess the next chapter is going to get some flames for Lee being OOC, so consider this chapter buttering you all up. Please review, and make me happppyyyyy again...


	5. Slow Motion

**Author's Note: Oh, ho-ho-ho. Here is the chapter I'll be getting flames about. Well, I hope you all can tolerate a violent, half-insane Lee acting completely OOC, because that's what you're about to get. I don't know if you'll connect with Rian's pain, or just scream at your dearest HMR for making him sleepdeprived!Lee. What can I say? Exhaustion and stress do funny things to your mind. **

**Also, this may or may not have to do with all of the abusive men suddenly surfacing in my life. That is your call, my Readers. But, please try to get that Lee is extremely stressed out, tired, angry at himself, and- Oh, pepperpot. Just read it, and flame me to a crisp if you hat eit. This will play into the later chapters, and it fits the theme that even the purest and seemingly most perfect of relationships can spiral downward. With just. One. Slap from him.**

**"Hellz naw!"- Property of Kali Carlozzi. :P**

Lee nearly jumped when the snake-like objects slid down his shoulders, before going taut around his neck.

On the desk in front of him lay a scroll, instructing proper chakra moulding for a well-used Shinobi technique. The ink was faded with age, the edges torn and tattered from excessive use. His fingers drummed rhythmically on the corner, making the paper bob in time to the shadows dancing across the rice paper from the flicker of the lone candle illuminating the darkened room.

Rian's exhales beat a warm metronome against his ear as she leaned over his shoulder, silky curls of messy hair tickling the side of his face. Her green eyes flickered, reflecting the empty, gloomy shadows created by the smoldering wick of the blue flame so near that it might singe his face if he leaned any closer.

Lee exhaled through his bitten lips, making no move to crack the silence that froze the air with a sinister tinge.

He'd been studying the scroll early in the evening, trying to translate the kanji into actions that he could perform, even if the technique might as well be forbidden, for all the good it did. But now, in the wee hours of the night, his only source of light melting into a puddle at his side, the slashes of paint seemed nothing more than blurred blobs of a demented mind. He'd stopped understanding any of the words a long time ago, but something kept his aching, numb body glued to the chair, his legs cold from dangling over the edge of the unforgiving seat for so long.

He was having to keep his head propped in his hand, because his neck couldn't support the weight anymore. His vision was blurred and grainy, eyelids heavy and his saliva flavored bland with distaste for the waking world. Catatonia was good word for his state, eyes riveted to the tea-colored roll of paper as the letters jiggled and vibrated in a maddening dance trying to hypnotize him into sleep.

He'd been staring at the slashes of words and numbers, figures that no longer made any sense, listening to his candle gut itself out for he-didn't-know-how-long. He had no perception of time anymore. It was all blurred into a bloody mélange of chakra points and terms and phrases and raindrops on roses and girls in white dresses, and he didn't know all what else.

His head buzzed with pain, temples branching a throbbing migraine throughout his skull. His shoulders were taut and strummed with aches from sitting slouched over the wooden tabletop for so long. The flimsy chair wobbled with each breath he took, a heartbeat to the drops of candle wax falling to the wooden tabletop.

And he was cold. So, cold. He was shivering and numb from head to toe, his fingers barely feeling when he touched the cheap wood of the desk's top. He was trembling and shaking from the combination of exhaustion and lack of shirt, every hair on his body standing on end as his mind tried to warm him through reflex movements.

But, Rian's arms snaking around his neck had slowed his wild quivering. Her breaths were foggy, eyes heavy-lidded with sleep. Oh, damn, she was so god-awful warm. He wished to heaven he could just fall asleep right there in her embrace, safe and protected. She was a decorated reminder of better days before, days of ignorance and flowery promises, and sickly-happy feelings that he wondered about the existence of.

God, she smelled so good. He resisted the urge to tilt his head back and nuzzle his face into the crook of her neck and hollow out a place to hide his pain. He felt his body tip forward, fatigue threatening arrest over him. No. He couldn't- he had to finish this scroll of, of- he didn't even remember what it was. But, he had to. He had, had to-

When was the last time he'd slept? How many soldier pills had he taken? Why, why was he so tired- He had to, to protect his- his..

The bliss of catatonia was almost enough to make Lee forget.

But, no. He couldn't forget.

"I didn't mean to wake you up." he said, tone offering no real apology. He'd forgotten how to put meanings with words as of late. It was a wonder he even remembered how to speak, after tonight's cram session. His tongue was slick with tasteless saliva as he ground it against his teeth, trying to rouse himself through the small amount of pain it brought. The man steeled himself, trying to sit up and square his shoulders. He was doing it for her sake. A hero wasn't much of something to look up to if he appeared weak, and Lee wasn't weak. He wasn't. Nor would he appear to be so. He was strong, and he was a protector.

A protector who had failed.

Above the pain of his aching, fatigued body, the weight of what he might have done was truly crushing him.

"You didn't. I was already up." she said, apparently oblivious to the hurricane of thoughts whirling inside of her husband's head as it lolled back against her shoulder. She reached up, fingers ghosting across his forehead, and brushed the shingled bangs from his dark-rimmed eyes.

Lee was a mess. Black stubble lined his chin and cheeks, his eyes hollow with a glint of what Rian prayed was just exhaustion. He was all but as limp as a rag doll, flopping against the back of his chair as though all of his bones had been broken.

The painted smile on her face might have sent a small sensation of comfort to the disheveled face snuggled between her arms, but anyone could tell it was all false.

They'd been back-stepping and back-stabbing for too long. Lee felt deeply, and the combined stress of his Shinobi life and recent events was ripping him to pieces on the inside. Like a parasite, he was feeding off her collected anger, her reservoired fear, and her uncertainty of what tomorrow might bring. Her feelings were leaking out into her day-to-day behavior, and Lee could sense even what she didn't say, those rich undercurrents of turmoil bubbling just beneath her skin. He could sense the roiling pain that was making her fall to pieces inside, but he didn't know what was causing it, or how he could stop it. And that was what was killing him.

They'd been dancing on eggshells for days, daring not speak a word more to each other than the most basic of conversation. Both of them were afraid to break the tedious teeter-totter of emotions, as though one more breath to form a word would send them both careening downwards at the same terminal velocity that pervaded their dreams every night.

In a few days, they'd gone from bliss married couple, to ticking time bombs with wicks lit by secrets, lost in the hurricanes of their own emotions and unable to speak the sentences that could mercifully end the whirlwinds inside of their heads.

Just one breath. One sentence. One heart-to-heart conversation could have prevented the unhappy ending to this story.

But, instead, they joined this mad merry-go-round of clandestine, needless half-truths, saying only as much as they thought the other would care to know. And it would all end in a hurricane of darkness and pain, their once-blue skies raven with acidic rain.

Hindsight is 20/20, I guess.

A pressed groan whistled from Lee's throat as he bent back over the edge of his desk, leaning closer to the torn, frayed rice paper that seemed older than time. Black hair shifting down to curtain his face, Lee didn't know that that was the first wall he would put between Rian and himself.

Rian's silken arms stayed knit around his neck, dragging her onto her tip toes as he leaned closer to the jiggling smudges of words. She flailed for a moment, before catching her balance and cherishing the last time she would ever hold Lee in her arms.

Diligently riveting his attention to the tattered scroll, he blinked lazily at the sensation of a hand sliding up his neck as Rian pushed herself back. In spite of himself, he was glad she was going. The longer she left him alone, the more time he'd have to train and read, free of interruption. She'd been bothering him every so often for the past few days, just walking into the room enough to prick his temper. Couldn't she just leave him alone? He needed peace to be able to learn this technique. She was so ungrateful, sometimes. He was destroying himself for her, and she was just getting in the way of him trying to do her a favor.

Anger bubbled up just beneath Lee's surface, making him unconsciously curl his lip up to reveal his once-shining teeth. She didn't think he would rather just keep living as though everything was alright? He wanted nothing more than to just sleep off the coil of guilt that was strangling him. But, he couldn't. No. He was too busy making himself a vessel to save churlish wives and thankless whores from harm to even consider anything but pushing himself beyond his limits. He knew the technique he was reading about was impossible. He couldn't mould chakra. But maybe, in some half-cocked hope- _Don't push it_, he warned the thought, feeling something primal begin to rouse itself from a catatonic sleep deep within him. He was too tired, and too agitated to deal with _nagging little doubts_, so they could just shut the hell up!

Lee was spread too thin, his mind too exhausted to think rationally; Too pain-filled and too hysterical with uncertainty to even begin to understand the weight of what was truly going on. Even the most pleasant of people have a monster of anger lying dormant within them, awoken in their most depraved state of mind.

Maybe his normally honeyed temper being boiled to the breaking point was what set off the very first fight he and Rian ever had.

It's too bad it would be a domino effect.

Lee could have heard the drop of annoyance sizzle as it hit his burning temper. A positive scowl began to misshape his face as his numb skin prickled with the sensation of Rian leaning over his shoulder. His taut nerves were building, trembling under the weight of his pent feelings. It was only a matter of time before his annoyance level hit the red zone, and more fury than he could ever have on the battlefield would be released.

Rian lethargically brought one hand up, tucking a clump of his matted, midnight-black hair behind a scarred ear, freeing his blurred vision a little more. Running her fingers tenderly down the slope of his face, she absent-mindedly began tracing his cheekbone with her middle finger, staring haphazardly at his side profile.

Oooohh. Lee hand fisted where Rian couldn't see it. Trying to tunnel his concentration to the words, he pushed aside any awareness of touch, or sensation. He wished he didn't have skin, so he could be unfeeling and solely dedicate himself to this mission, without her little fondlings and silvery fingers ghosting up and down his neck. His temper began bubbling with a new fervor as he clenched his fingernails into his palm, trying to control himself.

Calmly, he blinked his eyes closed, and stiffened his upper body, hoping Rian would get the message, and just go away. There was no reason to get snippy, a shred of his conscience told him as it restablished itself in his thinking. No. Everything would be just fine. Rian would leave him alone, he'd become stronger, and they'd all live happily-

A shudder rippled up Lee's spine as he winced, his back going taut with a sudden, piercing arrow of pain. His hands clawed into the surface of the table, shoulders hunching up to his ears as he half jumped from his seat with the sudden spasm.

Rian raised an eyebrow, before pinching at the hardened knots of pulled muscles with her thumb once more. God, he was a mess. Sitting in the same position for hours had literally tied Lee's back in knots. His shoulder blades were practically jutting from his back like shelves, and his neck was one lump of tied-up nerves and tendons.

One eye shut, her tongue poking out one corner of her mouth, Rian set to kneading the lumps out of Lee's shoulder blades. Geez. He was just one big decorated emergency, wasn't he?

She truly didn't understand why he was doing this to himself. What was worth destroying himself for?

Maybe if she had guessed, their story might have ended on a happier note.

If he had only told her why, and if she had only told him why.

"Please stop that." Lee said, trying to keep his tone even as he rested his pinging head against his hand. Rian always knew how to get those knots out of his shoulders, but tonight, it wasn't helping. He needed.

An icy tendril of anger shot up. - to be. Alone.

Rian stepped back, her foot scratching on the wooden floor as she stared at Lee's hunched back.

What? That was- so un-Lee-like, to say something in such a formal, cold tone of voice. It was almost as though he hadn't said it. She wanted to believe he hadn't, but as it stood-

What was wrong with him? He'd been as tempermental and cranky as she was for the last few days.

Well, they just needed to talk it over, she guessed, shrugging as she pressed one hand to her stomach. She could help him out, if he told her what was wrong.

Rian went into their first conflict with such a positive, ignorant outlook on the situation.

Feeling himself ripple with shivers, Lee tried to, with as much dignity as he could salvage, return to his reading. As soon as he was finished with this scroll, he could- No, he couldn't keep thinking that. Focusing on his own indulgences, rather than the people who meant most to him. Rian might be ungrateful for what he was doing now, but someday, she'd thank him for it. Just because she was being selfish didn't mean that he had to be. He was a vigilante, a protector, even if it meant personal sacrifice. _Especially_ if it meant personal sacrifice. Someday, he'd get his reward, and all of his suffering would be worth it.

And someday, Lee would wish that he could trade every word that he'd say for the words that he'd left unspoken.

The room was silent for a moment, free of the rustling of baggy pajamas and bare feet slapping the wooden floor. The calm before the storm. And they were headed right into the eye of the hurricane.

Rian tried to feel the words forming on her tongue before she said them. Some sort of warning flag leapt up within her, telling her that she was treading on thin ice. One misstep, one wrong word, and everything could come crashing down around her. Her progress of empathetic feelings and comforting words had come amazingly far from the detached lessons Neko-Chan had given her on the subject. Nowadays, she felt people's pain in ways she never had as a child under the neko's thumb. It was a basic human action, but Rian had had to relearn it after she'd been sealed. Lee had helped her, of course, and now was a test of all the progress she'd made in that area.

It's too bad that no words would be right. Rian didn't have a fighting chance.

"Lee." Addressed taijutsu master barely grimaced at the feeling of his wife clasping his arm as the tender words struck his ears. Her trepidating tone set the stage for their final act, and in a few seconds, they would be past the point of no return.

"Hon, you've been, taking it really hard the past few days-" she said, trying to keep her tone low and non-prodding. If one thing sent Lee over the edge, it was trying to be told what to do. He was still that way from their childhood, she supposed. It came from being forced to the bottom of the pecking order all of these years. Lee had to be a protector, and in control. Now, it was Rian's turn.

"You look exhausted. Why don't you, you know- take a break?" she hinted casually, brushing a stray piece of lint from the arm of his scant, white T-shirt, as though nothing else mattered on earth.

"I'm fine." came the almost instantaneous answer, thrown like a kunai and laced with something Lee had never spoken with before. Coiling his body, he bent his shoulders until they touched his ears, and hunched himself closer to the edge of the wooden table top.

Rian blinked at the words, silencing herself for a moment. Was this really Lee she was talking to?

Some sort of foreboding should have reminded her that Neko-Chan's out-of-characteristic volatilieness had been a starting gun for his betrayl. But no, Rian had to think that she had put that 'incident' behind her.

She had to tell herself that he was just touchy and cross from lack of sleep, and working himself so hard. She had to tell herself that they hadn't just stepped off the edge of a yawning crevice, and were plunging on an irreversible trip down.

"Yes, but-" she pulled herself to him the smallest bit closer, mentally hinting that she was right there for him to lean on, if he should feel so inclined.

"You need to sleep. This scroll will still be here tomorrow. Why don't you just take a rest, for a few hours? Replentish your energy, hmm?"

Smiling mellowly to paint the image of care, she inched even closer, until his stubbley beginnings of a beard were scratching at her cheek. Blinking her green eyes closed, she tried to will him to listen to reason. He couldn't do the impossible all the time. Even he knew that, despite how much he was trying to reason with himself that he could. Compromising his health for this "quest" was something he should have outgrown. Perserverance was one thing. Obsession was another.

Nuzzling up to him, Rian forced herself to ignore the quaking aftershocks of his shattered patience gauge that were making him shiver. She would be there, no matter what, she promised herself. No matter what, in a fit of rage, he said.

It's too bad that he'd be letting his fists do the talking. Those were words not even Rian could coincide with.

If she felt his eye twitching at her side, she didn't betray it. Poor, ignorant little Rian just stood there, thinking that Lee was relapsing into his "I-Must-Become-Stronger" phase, for reasons all his own. He was a brilliant, revered Shinobi, even with his lack of chakra abilities: What could she tell him to reassure him in himself? All of his hard work would go to waste, if he didn't believe in himself. She never considered once that he was dragging himself through the mill for something more important.

Or how little she would trust him, after this ordeal was over.

Bloodshot, heavy-lidded eyes belayed vision the color of crimson. His palms were wet with slick blood, dredged up by his fingernails penetrating the skin as he fisted his unbandaged hands. And moreover, the quivers of arctic skin had now been replaced by shakings of the sheer desire to be left alone.

"WILL YOU GET OFF OF ME!!?!" he shouted, before gruffly reaching up and flapping his elbow to dislodge her arm. The patience meter had broken. Exhausted, broken, guilty, angry, and running on empty, this wasn't the last of the damage Lee would do that evening.

In fact, they'd only just passed the starting gate for the damage he would do.

Rian skittered backward, drawing her arms in blocking positions over her face and chest as she stared incredulously at Lee. Or, rather, the fact that he'd shouted at her, and was now hunching against his desk as though he could disappear into the cracked plaster wall.

Shock and surprise suddenly melted into Shinobi anger and trepidation. Despite the denial that she was even talking to Lee, Rian's mind flew to 'Fight' mode. She was prepared to take Lee down with her bare hands, if she had to. He was acting out of character, environmental triggers or none. And anything acting different was to be closely observed, to register it's threat level.

"Lee? What-" she began, mind floundering for the correct words. Small pants began to escape her parted, dried lips, aftermath of the adrenaline rush exploding from the pits of her stomach.

"GO AWAY." he rasped, shielding his face and taut grimace from her. Like a monster retreating back into his shell, Lee curled his knees to his chest, tucking his arms around his face as he grappled for some sort of hold through the swirling clouds of anger fogging his ability to think rationally.

"J-Just go away…" he whispered, not knowing that Rian hadn't heard his ineligable request. But, you could call what drove him to recoil from her a foretelling of how the evening would wrought.

The temperature in the room suddenly skyrocketed, the air alive with the electric impulses of a fight only first begun. The darkness seemed much more welcoming, even as more and more became apparent with the candle on the desk down to it's last few layers, and dying fast.

Her mind a wheel of feelings, Rian's emotions and actions immediately locked into Concern mode, above the thump of adrenaline pounding through her blood. Lee was hurting on the inside, and he was lashing out, in a way that he usually didn't. Physically, he was worn to a frazzled bundle of nerves, ready to go off at the smallest spark. But, on the inside, he was carrying the weight of the world in contrition and self-reproach. Now, it was her job to give him someone to lean on, and to try and share some of that burden, ease the tension from his spine-splintered shoulders.

Such were the workings of a marriage, right?

"Ssh, ssh. It's okay." she breathed, nearly as quietly as he. Inching toward him as though he were a bomb set to explode the minute she got near, she waited until he was still and quiet, only racking with trembling, before reaching and tentatively touching him. Unanimated, Lee gave no reaction as her fingers grazed his T-shirt.

Words failed her. What could she say- ask? What could coax Lee back out of the shell he'd retracted himself into? The past few days, he'd just seemed to shrivel away into his own world, blocking her out and ignoring every advance towards intimacy, even human contact, she'd made. He seemed to just glue himself to his manuals and scrolls, holing up at his desk and ignoring her. The negligence, she could handle. She was more worried about Lee's mental condition. In his lack of motion, there was more than a physical numbness: There was a spiritual one, as well. As dead as he was to the outside world, he was even more dead to himself, on the inside.

And Rian didn't know why.

"J-just.." he began, prepared to repeat the words he'd warned her. There was- a strange, uncontrollable twanging on the inside of his head, an irrefutable monster of pent nerves and emotions bashing at the walls of his mind, bent on being released. It had been festering inside of him for years, building with every rude comment, every put down, every slip on the climb toward his dream- It was more deadly than any Tailed Beast, because it could lance only the closest things to Lee's heart; His loved ones.

And suddenly, it broke.

Jerking his head from where he'd been cradling it in his hands, Lee spun and glared at his wife's shocked expression with more fury than she had ever seen present in his face- even when his life was being threatened.

That was it. That was it. That was it. That was iiiiiitt. He'd had enough of this. That monster inside of him shattered it's mental strongholds, and escaped into his emotions, feelings, very blood, pumping him with insanity of the fears and doubts he'd let gnaw at his being for all those years.

He could have killed her. Those words had never left his conscious thinking since he'd awoken in the Hospital hours after the ordeal.

These hands, he noted as the numb fingers began to twitch. These hands could have murdered her. Did he know that? Did he really realize that?

Did he realize the weight of the situation? Rian could have been dead. The person he'd sworn to protect with all of his life, until his dying breath. She. Could. Have. Been. Dead. Gone. Lost. Forever. Nothing would have brought her back. Nothing.

Love was no power. It wouldn't have saved her, or kept her from the harm he'd inflicted on her. He could love her all for nothing, but it wouldn't do either of them a lot of good if he didn't have the power to back it up.

He needed to become stronger, for her. This was a revelation, a stark impact to the truth. How had he managed to stumble through life all of these years, blissfully ignorant that he couldn't protect the ones he'd promised to defend? All his life, all those promises, for naught. Pride had given him the fatal idea that he was strong enough to defend his Precious People. He was wrong. Wrong, wrong, so wrong. How could he have ever thought that he was fast enough, smart enough, powerful enough to keep her safe?

No more. He was through pussyfooting around about this. It had taken a brush with death for him to realize it, but not another day would pass without Rock Lee there to defend his honor, his family, and his country.

Never again would he waste a day indulging himself. He would work harder than any man, any ninja, to become the best of the best. Never would Rian or anyone suffer because of his stupidity.

This was his new Nindo. He would never, ever, lose another person through a fatal error in judgment.

There had to have been something he could have done. He should have watched Hidan more closely; should have been at Rian's side sooner. Should have formulated a better plan of attack. Shouldn't have left a gap in their defenses. Should have, should have, should have- why didn't he?

Why didn't he realize this sooner.

Someone, someone who meant more than the world to him could have been _lost_ because of _him_.

Why didn't he realize it before it was too late?

And now, she was getting all up in his hair while he was trying to do her this _favor_! It was that simple. He'd never expected any thanks for his silent deeds, but he needed _some _sort of retribution, dammit! Rian acted like she didn't _know_ what he was doing for her! She was so, so _ungrateful_, like every one of those kids when they were children, all mocking and poking at him, judging him and staring at him as though he were a bug under a microscope glass.

She was being just like them, he scowled.

Half-crazed on his own guilt, Lee was running on empty, and therefore susceptible to the insane thoughts whirling inside of his head. He dared not think that his own legs would support him if he jumped to them, but he was already grounded in anger enough to be able to stand as long as he wished.

"You're such a selfish bitch!" he had shouted, before he even knew the words had left his tongue.

Rian's eyebrows jumped underneath her bangs, viridian orbs widening at the language her huffing, glowering husband dared use against her. In a second, she'd narrowed her eyes and returned the hateful vibes piercing her shields of tolerance.

"Excuse me? What have _I_ done that was so gravely selfish, lately?!" she hissed, her glare venomously telling him to lower his voice. What was with him today? This week? Why was he attacking _her _because he was grinding himself into the ground!? What did she do to him?

"You don't appreciate anything I do for you, that's what!" Lee shot back, scrunching his nose beneath the curtain of his bangs. Did she think she could pretend that she didn't know? Please. It took more than that to pull the wool over his eyes. It was an insult, spread over the generous layer of malevolence he was already feeling and agitating his festering dislike of her.

Rian's fist clenched at her side, trembling as she squeezed all of her anger into the knit mesh of fingers and palm.

"Gee, sooooorry! As I recall, all you've done lately is hole up with your stupid taijutsu scrolls, smelling like a goat and acting like I don't exist!"

Ah, their first fight. Seven years without a single one, and you get to witness their first. Don't you feel special?

The neglect had pierced her heart, no matter how much she wouldn't admit it to herself. It wasn't so much a matter of conceit as it was that Lee had become so, so distant. His uncharacteristic lack of affection terrified her. Without that hurried morning kiss, or that whispered 'I love you' when he hugged her from behind, Lee just didn't seem like the same young man she'd fallen head over heels in love with. It was as though a chunk of him had fallen out, and she had to find the missing piece without knowing why it had disintegrated. She felt confused at his actions, lost in his tempermental missingness, and alone. Utterly alone.

And more than anything on earth, Rian couldn't exist if she was alone.

An aura of building hate was flaming around Lee's hunched form, the heat licking at the fists planted on Rian's hips. His raven eyes slits, the Taijutsu master growled, before unleashing his next verbal attack.

"I'm doing this _for_ you, whether you understand it or not! I'm doing this because I love you!" he snarled.

"Oh, yeah! Nice excuse for that 'I-have-an-inferiority-complex-and-have-to-become-stronger-Nindo crapload. Don't lie to me, Lee. I can take anything but lies."

At this, Lee lunged to his feet, sending his chair clattering back against the wall. Rian winced backwards as he drew his fists to his chest, stabbing himself in the heart with one finger. Blind rage was evident in his bloodshot eyes and bunching, stress-taut muscles underneath his white shirt, and all of the sudden, she realized- Lee had become terrifying.

"Y-you think I'm _lying_? That I'm doing this for personal gain!?" Lee stuttered in the face of her gall. H-how could she think, even for a second, that give-and-never-take-back, compassionate him could ever, _ever_, be so selfish and conceited!? It was outrageous. The nerve of this, this person who wasn't the Rian he'd give his life for!

"It seems a pretty obvious explanation." she spat, leaning into his face with defiance. Her mind was flashing warning lights in some primal instinct, reading the hostility in Lee's every action, but her anger kept the feelings at bay.

Gritting his yellowed teeth, Lee positively snarled. The very impudence of her- How dare she speak that way to him!  
Suddenly, Lee's mind forgot how to distinguish between wife and common offender. The ear-shattering climax of the fight would be fraught with the sounds of him unleashing his anger, unbeknownst to him.

"You, you backstabbing whore! Never once did you think that I was doing this for you, did you!?!"

"Doing what? Neglecting life and hiding away in your own little world!?"  
"No!"

Rian's feet slid her backwards as Lee stabbed her in the chest harder than he should have for emphasis. He stomped forward with every step she made backwards, backing her up until she was halfway across the room, and than leaning over her until she was nearly bending backwards to stare him insolently in the eyes. Inside, terror was making her blood run cold. Somewhere, Lee had changed. He was no longer the caring safety net for her to fall back against. Now, he was something she'd long forgotten that he could be. Her muscles jerked with readiness to fight back, should the need arise.

A threat.

"_Destroying_ myself, so that I can protect _ungrateful_, _selfish_, people that I call Precious! I'm working my ass off, trying to become stronger, to fill that gap that seperates you from death when you're in my care! I'm killing myself, because _I love you_! And you-"

Slamming his foot to the side, Lee sent some random object skittering into the darkness. An audible sound was heard as the object penetrated the plaster, sending hair line fractures inching up the wall.

Swiping his fist to the side, he stuck his finger straight in her face, drawing her attention to his enraged expression as he poured every inch of his burden into the droplets of saliva pelting her countenance.

"-You just act like it's nothing! You don't even _care_! You're just trying to make me _stray_ from my work because you, you want my _attention_! Look at the bigger picture here, you narrow minded container of a monster!! "

Those words flew as straight as a shruiken, before striking Rian directly in the heart as no words could.

H-He'd promised, he would never hold that against her.. He'd promised to never think the lesser of her for it-

He wouldn't be standing in front of her if she _wasn't _the container of a monster.

Her thoughts waxed over as she stood, the word shooting back and forth in her mind like machine gun fire. Her mouth went agape, momentarily paralyzed. But in a moment, she had a retort of her own forming.

"And those are the words of a gentleman! So that's your real opinion of me? Thank you for explaining it so fully after we were bound legally!"

"Don't change the subject, Rian! You're pushing me to-"

"To do what? What are you gonna do, Mr. Pompous!? Go ahead! Show me what you can do, Big Bad Prick!-"

The next icy seconds would brand themselves into Rian's mind forever, sandblasting themselves into her every conscious thought, and throwing them both into a dead spin on the way they were carving downwards.

Her face exploded with pain as a resounding slap echoed through the small apartment, a shattering climax to the screaming battle only seconds before.

Rian thudded against the floor, hitting the wide planks shoulder-first as her cheek throbbed with pain. There was no flashy ninja move, or a flourish of chakra to accent the strike. It was just a pure, unadultered slap.

That blow detonated the bomb that would destroy Rian on the inside.

Lee's hand formed a claw at his side, throbbing and shaking from sheer rage as Rian's body spiked into the ground. He'd never planned to hit her. In two years of marriage and five years of infatuation, the thought had never crossed his mind. Not once. But, in an overwhelming display of dominance, it was the only way to shut her smug little mug up and make her listen to him.

In an instant he was charging forward, ready to finish the job. Oh, she would wish she'd never opened her mouth-

Rian was jerked to hanging several inches off the ground by the front of her shirt, a second before the other side of her face erupted with the force of Lee slamming his fist into it. She would **_pay_** for every, single one of those comments, a sputtering, flickering voice hissed from the depths of Lee's buried malevolence.

Knuckles imbedded themselves in eye sockets, fists repeatedly hitting the spongy sense of give that was Rian's arms as she reached up to feebly block his hands away and clawed hands wringing their way around necks filled the next few seconds of the most violent beating she had ever received from anyone other than enemy Shinobi. So violent, perhaps, because she never made a move to fight back. Couldn't. The shock of Lee, _Lee_, the man who didn't put salt on slugs and rescued spiders she would have squooshed, striking out in anger, beating at her as though she were no more than a training log, was just too great. There was no way she could have made a move to defend herself. It was all so surreal. In some lapse of consciousness as the world exploded in fireworks of purple, orange, and black, she found herself praying to whatever force could assist her to make this all nothing more than a nightmare, even when stark reality of fingernails dragging trails of blood down her neck was spitting directly in her face.

She knew all too well that it wasn't.

With a growl, Lee sent her spiraling backwards like a football into the darkness of their living room, her hands clawing for some sort of hold on something, anything, to steady the world as it spiraled in front of her eyes, stained crimson by her own blood-

The sound of the wall around her collapsing as she struck the weak chipboard was deafening, plaster crumbling and nearly burying her as she slumped to the ground, back sliding against the lath of the inside of the wall. A cloud of fine powder burst upwards, like the mushroom cloud of a nuclear explosion, gradually dancing into inexistence, even as Rian crawled into a half-sitting position from beneath the pile of shattered wood beams and flaking plaster.

The room, which had been electric with verbal stabs and the sounds of violence was suddenly deafeningly quiet, save for the panting of breaths.

Rian's eyes, wide with the most absolute terror she had ever felt in her entire life- more than the night that Neko-Chan had revealed his true identity, more than the day she had confessed her love to Lee, more than the middle of any seemingly-hopeless battle surrounded by thousands of enemies she had ever felt- sparkled like emeralds in the flickering, trembling light of the nearly-gutted candle on the desk.

Mouth parted in sheer fear, Rian silently begged with her widened irises what she had ever done to deserve such, such a- she didn't even know, in her fragmenting mind what to call it.

He hated her. He'd hurt her, and told her with his fists how much he despised her.

Her worst nightmare had come true, and there was nowhere to run from this cruel hand of Fate. He'd shown her exactly how he felt about her, and her aching body was but a trifle compared to the pain in her heart that was worse than any kunai could inflict.

Neko-Chan had taught her about hate. If he'd taught her nothing, he'd taught her about hate. The Shinobi world was built on planks of violence, and it was malevolence that she existed daily in. Ninja knew how to hate, because sometimes it was the only thing that kept them from downright giving up on living- It was an international language between Shinobi, and the characters were forever engrained into hardened soldier's minds.

And Lee had just said, in plain Hate, that he despised her. For a reason she couldn't understand.

Lee only stood, chest heaving with rage and hands in claw shapes at his sides as he glared at the prone form of his blood-soaked, inadequately punished wife. Adrenaline pulsed over the throbbing of blood in his ears, his body alive with the sensation of his anger being relased through the flurry of attacks he'd unleashed into the smug face of that ungrateful-

And suddenly, the light disappeared from his eyes as the world buckled under his feet.

Rian's trembling irises only stared into the depths of his soul, begging, pleading for an answer that he could not give. Panic and horror instantly buried any thrill he might have felt as an icy chill rushed up his spine.

What had he done!? Oh, god, no. Please, don't let this be happening- He prayed, even as stark realization beat down any hope that he might have had. He couldn't have. He never would have- Not that. He wasn't- He'd.. he'd- The evidence was right in front of his eyes.

"R-Rian." he pleaded, eyes beseeching as he took a step forward, one hand outstretched as he tentatively tried to step over the yawning crevice that had suddenly opened up between them.

She didn't even give him the chance to explain.

In seconds, Rian was scrambling up, fingernails digging into the punch-colored wood of the living room floor as she scuttled like a beaten animal across the room.

And that's just what she was, too.

The door flew open, and Rian was thundering down the stairs and bursting out the door of their apartment building into the cold night air, the shimmering stars above bleeding into the azure sky as her eyes welled with tears. Bare feet slapping the concrete, she sent burning chakra into her heels to bring her faster and faster towards the only safe haven she could think of in her destroyed mind.

And somewhere within her, Neko-Chan smirked knowingly.

* * *

"… Aw, hellz naw!"

This was Tenten's exclamation after the shock of having Rian knock on her door at 2:30 a.m. and the realization had set in as she watched the dried blood on the brunette's face flow crimson again with tears wetting the caked life.

Rian, hands tucked into her lap demurely, continued staring hopelessly at her best friend from across the coffee table, crying silently as the shock of it all began to brand itself into her thinking. She'd run through the night, flying through the streets as fast as her legs would carry her to Tenten, her best friend and teammate. Only she would understand, and hold her while she cried, she knew. It all still seemed like a nightmare, too horrible to be real-

"HELLZ NAW!" Tenten screamed, her swollen stomach bouncing as the pregnant woman leapt to her feet and stabbed a finger at Rian.

"OH, NO HE DIDN'T!" she shouted again, doing nothing more than loudly declaring her disbelief of the entire situation. Lee? A wife beater!? It was horrendously out of character for him; I mean, the boy had been downright mopey about having to put out rat poison, and didn't step on cockroaches. How did slapping Rian around add up to that!? It couldn't be true. It just couldn't-

The disgusting, despicable proof was sitting before her eyes.

In a flash, she was bounding over the coffee table and bending over Rian's blood-smeared face to inspect the purpling bruises and dark, raccoon-like circles where Lee had punched her directly in the now-swollen eyes.

The sound of slippers beating the wooden stairs rang through the living room, and in seconds, a sleep-rumpled Neji, eyes half-slitted and crusted with sleep, appeared, a sleeping Kei on one shoulder.

"What's all the yelling about?" he rasped, trying to keep his tone even. His colicky daughter had hardly allowed him an hour of sleep, and he had a mission in a few hours. How was he expected to get any rest with a bunch of women shouting and stamping about down in his living room? However, one smoke-colored eyebrow shot up when he recognized his teammate's wife seated on their couch.

"Rian? What are you doing here?" he asked hazily, stubbly cheeks contorting as he half-mouthed the question.

"You're never going to believe this." Tenten stated, her voice flourished with incredulousness as she peeled back Rian's eyelid to examine the swollen orb behind it.

"Lee beat her up."

Neji blinked incredulously, before thudding across the room to stand beside his wife and crying teammate. Beat her up? As in, they had a fight and he let his fists do the talking?

"Lee?" he asked breathlessly, his voice high and on tetherhooks as he passed the warm bundle of his daughter to his wife, intent on examing the situation himself.

Sure enough, Rian's face and neck were bruised and reddened, her eyes engored and puffy, circled with bloody cuts and scrapes. Angry scratches lay in stripes up and down her neck, and her shoulders were dark red from blows. Where her chest peaked out of her disheveled T-shirt, blotchy red splayed upwards across her skin. The Hyuuga's mouth fell open as he gazed at his teammate from a few different angles in absolute disbelief and foggy half-consciousness.

"Yep. They had a fight, and Lee tore her up." Tenten reaffirmed, her head bobbing as she tucked her chocolate-haired baby to her bosom, letting the child's feet rest on the swollen mass that was to be the third Hyuuga born to her and Neji.

Neji stepped back, watching as Rian ashamedly let her overflowing eyes well with tears once more. His bathrobe was half-sashed, clearly displaying his plaid drawstring pants and lack of shirt, and his hair was standing up on one side of his face. Corn stubble dotted his cheeks, and a five-o'clock-shadow was etching it's way across his upper lip. This had definitely caught him off guard, in more ways than one.

"I'm gonna go call Gai-sensei." he said, pointing as he whirled and thundered toward the kitchen. Unlike many men, Neji understood the gravity of the situation. Being shoved around was nothing to joke about, whether they were ninja or not: the kind of battle Rian had just crawled away from had nothing to do with fighting back physically. Years ago, he would have said, "Why didn't you take a damned kunai and fight back?". But, being married to Tenten had taught him a few things about the emotional tightropes between married couples. On the battlefield, a ninja could be ruthless and downright immoral to protect his country and family: But he never, _ever_, went home and hit his wife. It was just evil.

A red-clad, mussed head of brown hair and bleary lavender eyes appeared at the landing of the stairs, staring with sleep-fogged interest at the scene unfolding in his living room.

"Mommy, what's going on?" Ai asked, scratching lethargically at his face in order to rouse himself. Something interesting was going on, and he wasn't about to miss it- No matter how tired he was.

"Go to bed, sweetie." Tenten gently scolded, before striding over and pushing the fatigued child back upstairs in one swift movement. Well, perhaps the goings-on could wait, his five-year-old mind reasoned.

The child successfully thudding back up the stairs, she was back at Rian's side and studying the bruises as though she were catalouging them and was watching for one that she'd missed.

"I just don't understand it." she noted quietly, disbelief evident in her rumbling, motherly timbre. "What could make him do this? To you, even?"

Rian tilted her chin to her chest, asking herself the same question.

Everyone visibly jumped as the unlocked front door flew open, and a jumpsuit-clad man strode across the pine-colored wooden floor, sandals beating a tattoo that lightened in tone as they hit the carpeted floor.

One tanned hand flew to Gai's mouth as he froze, eyes widened with horror when his gaze met his adopted student's face. In an instant, he had thrown himself onto Rian's prone form, hugging her to his vest-clad chest as though she would break within his grasp.

When he was over his shock, the older man sat back into a crouch position, holding Rian by her shoulders at arm's length and staring slack-jawed at the girl's countenance as though he didn't believe what he was seeing.

"Oh, my god." he said, reaching up to brush the bangs from her bruised forehead with all the fatherly tenderness Rian had known he would exhibit.

In a moment, Gai was wretching. Leaping up with one hand firmly pressed over his mouth, the Jounin stumbled towards the bathroom and slammed the door behind him. Gagging noises, and the sound of vomit cascading into the toilet bowl could clearly be heard, as Gai emptied the dinner Anko had made for them into the porcelian recepticle, the white blurring as his raven eyes brimmed with tears. Neji wasn't the only one who understood what kind of beating she'd gotten. And right than, sheer and utter disbelief was making him empty his stomach.

Rian hadn't expected such a fanfare, or for Neji to call the nearest thing to a father she had. But, she was glad to have so many caring people around in the face of the loss she had just experienced. It helped cushion the blow, somewhat.

She tried to lose herself in the sweet-smelling flannel of Tenten's pajama shirt as the kunoichi tried to hug her over the warm swelling of her child. In that moment, Rian detachedly realized that there were two children being pressed against each other. Tenten noticed, too, and squeezed her friend a little tighter to let her know that she realized it as well. Her teammate was the only one Rian had dared let in on her little enigma.

A knock resounded on the front door, making everyone in the room suddenly freeze, if only for a moment. Neji strode across the room as Tenten continued to hold Rian, whispering reassuring promises into her long-suffering best friend's ear. Rian simply hugged back as gently as she could, wetting the collar of Tenten's shirt with tears.

The doorknob clicked, and Neji shifted back to allow the door to shift open. Rian closed her eyes, nearly blocking out the Jounin's contemplative voice as he evenly stressed, "Oh, Lee. Come on in."

Tenten heard it too, for her eyes bugged open, and she tossed Rian backwards, all embraces forgotten.

"That monster is not coming in my house!" she raged, waving a fist in the air as Neji turned around to glance at her, lavender eyes widened in question. Hair loosed from her usual buns, the brunette mother of three glared seethingly at him, before breaking to glance at Rian as the girl positively shriveled in horror. She didn't need this right now. Men just didn't understand-

In a whoosh of night air, Lee burst past his male teammate, his eyes wide and breaths coming sharply. He'd spent the last few minutes tearing around the Village, trying to catch up with his wife and all the while trying to think of where she would go in the face of such a paramount. His blood was icy with terror, and more regret than he had ever known it possible to possess was churning in his gut. He was numb with horror the entire chase, his mind turning itself inside-out as he tried to think of some way to fix the irreversible damage he had caused.

"Rian-" he breathed tautly, before stepping forward, arms outstretched as he began to reason something he could say to begin to tell her how sorry he was for, for-

Suddenly, he crumpled at the hip and flew to the side, a blue sandal imbedded in his torso as Gai came flying across the living room, roaring at the top of his lungs and Dynamic Entry-ed Lee into the wall. The Jounin crumpled to the floor, and his sensei leapt on top of him with a scream of pure rage.

The room suddenly came alive with the sound of Gai punching and beating at whatever part of Lee he could reach first, Neji trying to restore order to the room, Rian crying with renewed fervor, with Tenten's blood-dredging comments spurring Gai onward and drowning out both teammate's cries.

"NO, NO, NO!!" the Jounin raged, Lee's head bouncing as it struck the wooden floor with the force of the Green Beast's fist planting itself into the boy's nose. Seated on top of Lee's stomach, Gai pounded with blind fury at the boy's face, trying to recreate the damage he had caused to his little student. How dare Lee- his own flesh and blood pseudo son- Where had he gone wrong, to create a wife beater out of the boy he had practically raised!?

"YOU MONSTER!! HOW DARE YOU LAY A FINGER ON HER! WHAT KIND OF BASTARD CHILD HAVE I BROUGHT YOU UP TO BE!??!! WHERE DID YOU STRAY FROM THE PATH OF MORALITY, YOU COWARD!?! LITTLE BUG!! I SHOULD BEAT YOU TO AN INCH OF YOUR LIFE, YOU HORRIBLE, DESPICABLE BOIL ON THE ASS OF SOCIETY-"

"Gai-sensei!" Neji shouted commandingly, his Byakugan activating by reflex as he leaned his head into the fray to screech directly into Gai's ear.

"Get **off** of him, so that we may restore some measure of peace to my home." the Jounin hissed, spittle spraying into his sensei's ear.

Gai scowled, scrunching his face up at the thought of letting Lee go "unpunished", but complied by crawling off of his student. But, of course, not before getting one last punch in, using all the power of Youth to deliver a bitch-slap to Lee's tanned cheek.

Sprawled out on his back, swirly-eyed and mouth lolling open, Lee was spread-eagle on the floor, watching stars- entire constellations spiral in front of his eyes. His head pounded with the blows inflicted on him, and his tongue slid limply out one corner of his bleeding lips. Gai had hit him hard, but just enough to make his head snap, crackle and pop. The man wanted him conscious when he crawled down his throat and out his rear end about the entire issue.

Rian, hands curled over her mouth, stared in terror at the man she had married, forgetting for a second the pain of her swelling, purple splotched face in concern for Lee. She didn't know what was more frightening- coming face-to-face with the man who had beat her so shortly after the incident, or the fact that Gai had clobbered him into a white and black frazzle in front of her eyes.

Tenten glowered, resisting the urge to leap on her bowl-cut teammate and perform a salsa dance on his chest in her high heels. But, if he beat Rian this way, she couldn't imagine what he would do to her. She wasn't about to risk the safety of her unborn child, even to save face for Rian. She glanced over at Rian's curled form, and noted the anxiety in the girl's bleary, verdant eyes.

And as it stood, Rian needed a lot of face to replace the bruises covering her old one. And something to patch up the mental wounds.

"You have two seconds to explain why you did this before I Jyuuken you to hell." Neji stated icily, his voice as thin and deathly serious as a knife blade. Neji had never been particularly fond of his 'replacement' teammate, but this- God. This downright made him want to kill Lee, right than and there. What kind of monster did this, and to somebody he claimed to "love more than life", quote unquote?

Lee, somewhat recovered, scurried to his feet, not even bothering to dust his sweat and blood-soaked undershirt off. He had to see her- talk to her, apologize with every fiber of his being. He was so, so sorry- How could he ever make amends for this kind of behavior?

His bleak, distant gaze scanned the room, until they reached the teary, olive eyes that had pervaded his every conscious thought, from the instant after they had captured his gaze from the debris of the collapsed wall he had thrown her into. They displayed only a fraction of the fear, horror, swirling mix of terror and distrust that was blowing like a typhoon inside Rian's head, a deafening roar that blocked her every sense.

In a second, Tenten had slid in front of Rian, her hickory-colored orbs narrowed in absolute fury denying him even the priviledge of looking at her. Even in her prenatal state, the anger in Tenten's eyes and the stance the obese woman had taken was enough to send a shiver up Lee's back, even though the sensation never reached his cold-numbed mind.

"Talk." Neji hissed out one corner of his mouth, demanding for Lee to entertain him with some "reasonable" justification for the crime he had commited. The sentence had been declared, and the jury voted unanimously in light of the proof being shielded by Tenten's body. That, and the tear-filled gaze of his terror stricken teammate.

Lee's tongue pulsed against his lips as he wet the cracked, bleeding organs with saliva. He could feel every eye boring into him with utter malice from all directions. Neji, Tenten- even Gai-sensei, who had crossed his arms over his flak jacket in an attempt to keep himself from lunging at his student.

Breathing in, Lee spread both arms slightly in front of him, ready to shove away an attacker and flee, if need be.

"I, I just- I was so angry, and she had- I'm so, so sorry! God, what have I done?!" he shouted, ending the stuttering with a sharp cry. Eyes welling with tears, he gritted his teeth and nearly buckled under the hateful glances that heaped more guilt onto his breaking back.

"I don't know what, how I- All I know is, I never meant to hurt her- It just, happened.. Oh, Kami- I'm so sorry. I, I'd do anything to take it back…" They all only understood what they saw before them- There was no justification for what he'd done, he was aware of the fact. But, they had to understand- He'd been blind with anger, and too, too exhausted to understand.. why…  
"No." Tenten whispered, tone sure as a knife blade. Jutting one finger at Lee as his hands froze over his heart, the kunoichi let the throbbing anger within her expel into one calm, cool sentence.

"I want you to say that to her face." she stabbed throatily, trying to control her rage. How could he ever think that Rian would ever trust him again? Did he really just think that he could waltz in here with some preprepared speech to ease his own guilt and whisk her back into his vice, to repeat the process the next time he felt like having a temper tantrum? Even if Rian believed his little song and dance, Tenten wouldn't.

Nodding in a comforting gesture to herself, Tenten rose from her bent knees to her full height and reached around her back to clasp Rian's clammy hand. In a swift motion, she jerked her teammate to her feet, and strode a single step toward Lee.

"Say that little speech to her face." she snarled, before stepping aside.

Head titled downward, Rian could only avert her eyes to her own feet, locking her arms to her sides and praying that Lee would materialize, feeling her sensei and teammates awaiting her reaction to the needless punishment she had received.

Tenten gave her a jab in the ribs, sending her a step of two closer toward the trembling figure of the man she now feared more than even the power dwelling beneath the seal on her stomach. It took a moment to gather the courage to commit the action, but Rian's head jerked up defiantly after a taut moment of summoning her inner strength, narrowed eyes locking to Lee's widened, glassy own. Every muscle in her face screamed with pain, but she couldn't help but scowl her most terrifying battle glare at him, as though he were the greatest of enemies, and no closer to her heart than the scum of her nemesis's shoe soles. Even as what she really thought of the whole thing was still being deliberated on, she had to show some sort of resistance- She might have been his wife, but she was also a ninja; weakness was not tolerated, and she would return just enough of that malevolence in her first glance at him.

His reaction was nothing she had expected, and yet, one she had imagined he would do in her pre-shock daydreams of him repenting.

Eyes locked to hers, she sensed more than saw his trembling, shaking hand rise from his side until his fingertips could barely ghost over the swollen burgundy of the burst blood vessels beneath her skin.

In a two part inhaling that resounded as a gasp, Lee finally pressed enough against the side of her cheekbone to truly feel what he had done- and the real wounds he had inflicted. Here's a hint. They weren't the ones he could see on her pale, gaunt cheeks.

With a cry, he stepped backwards, as though Rian had the plague. He edged away from her, complete and total realization slamming down on him. Lee shuffled backwards until his knees buckled. As though he were being electrocuted, his body quivered and shook uncontrollably with the weight of the line he had crossed, the trust he had broken, the willing harm he had inflicted on the one he swore to protect-

He was his own biggest threat.

Throat rasping with a combination of sobs and exclamations of disbelief, Lee tucked his head between his forearms as the world spiraled out of control: He'd lost himself to the caged monster of rage, and he'd destroyed the dearest thing to him- No beating he could give could ever amount to the bond of trust he had shattered. And, it was his deliberate, iniquitous fault.

"I-I-I-I-I.." his voice droned, lips unable to form even a word to express his utter and complete contrition. Rian's shameless glance judgmentally drilled into the back of his neck, as though she were bored and expecting his reaction. In truth, it was the hardened glance of a Shinobi now gracing her olive orbs.

She blinked, closing her eyes a little longer than necessary, until she felt her hand firmly pressing the tightening skin of her abdomen. With a quiet exhale, Rian prepared her most deadly strike to Lee that she could ever use.

"I don't want him to have to ask where his Daddy went." she stated calmly, her voice chillingly cold, even surprising herself by it's deadpan timbre.

Lee's rasping ceased for a moment as his head bobbed up, bangs floating from his eyes to reveal two questioning, red-rimmed eyes, churning like brackish, charcoal sea water as he gazed at her inquiringly.

Gai and Neji's gazes followed, while Tenten's dropped to her swollen ankles. Her breaths beat a metronome through the milliseconds until Rian dropped the bomb. She'd been the only one Rian had told: Not even Lee knew about this… not-exactly blessed event.

In fact, (here, a tendril of anger shot up at the thought of it's life giver) it was more of a _cursed_ event.

Writhing on shaking knees and trembling shoulders, Lee's glimmering eyes sparkled in desperate questioning from between his elbows. The world was a void of sorrow and loss, and understanding the cryptic prologue was impossible.

Blinking her eyes open lazily, Rian met Lee's gaze unfalteringly as she stated, in the most detached, uncaring tone she could manage-

"If you're going to stick around long enough to see your child born, not killing him in a fit of rage would be advisable."

Lee stared at her, mouth agape, wondering at what she could-

The entire world bottomed out on him.

Gai's eyebrows rose past his hairline, his jaw flopping open as he gazed with incredulity at the turned head of his student. His eyes darted to the hand resting on her stomach- He hadn't noticed, in all these months of training and greeting her on the street corners, the bloated bulge accentuated by her fingers. And yet, in the gentle framing of lamplight, there it was. As clear as day. Rian was-

Neji's head whirled to meet Tenten's gaze, his lips mouthing the question. His wife nodded, her shimmering hair shifting with the movement as she shut her almond eyes from the world- from the pain that she could see in Rian's eyes.

Bringing a small life into the world, with no one to depend on- or having someone, but someone who had broken your trust in such a way-

Tenten didn't even entertain the notion that Rian, or even she herself, could ever bear such a thing. Without Neji behind her one hundred percent, Tenten would never have been able to support herself, let alone Ai and Kei. In fact, she would be dead right now.

Her stomach shuddered with a kick from the new life anxious to meet the world on the other side of his mother's stomach. It just went to show Tenten how sometimes she even took her husband for granted. She should be so thankful-

Rian turned away as Lee clambered to his feet, trying to slow the world's wild tilting and spinning as his gaze welded to Rian's back. Her fingers tapping a beat on her tightening abdomen, she kept her eyes cast to the strips of wood making up the Hyuuga's foyer floor. She'd told him. Her secret, the one she'd guarded so preciously for all these months.

She didn't know if the possibility that Tsunade was losing sleep over could come true, or even how this twist of anatomy had come about, but it stood like a stone wall in front of her face, insurmountable and solid. She was pregnant. Somehow, some way, but she was, and there was no changing the fact.

She could sense his fingers levitating inches above her shoulder, tentative to even brush her skin in light of the shock waves of the announcement echoing throughout his skull, his every conscious thought.

She, she was- he was a father. And, and he might have-

Teardrops, bittersweet mixtures of joy and utter self-repute, ran clear trails down his gaunt cheeks, making drop marks on his dust-coated sandals. Oh, dear Kami- H-him, and, and he was- She- The words didn't add into a readable sentence, but the sensation, and the memory of the news was enough to draw Lee away from the horrendous crime he'd committed for a few seconds, until the world came crashing back on him, and the truth slapped him harder than Gai ever could have.

Who knows what he could have done- If he'd have struck her in the stomach, he could have-

His thoughts shattered with the realization, leaving shards, like a broken mirror, in the charcoal-colored depths of his heart.

"Sorry isn't good enough." he said aloud, tilting his head back to relieve some of the pressure on his smarting head and heart.

"You're damned right." Gai answered immediately, silent for too long.

Blinking lazily, Gai strode from his place between Tenten and the sofa to before Rian, great fists knotted at his sides. When he reached her, he drove both hands out: One to her shoulder in the comforting gesture he'd consoled her with more times than she could remember, and the other to cup over the one Rian had rested against the life within her.

"You almost destroyed a miracle, Lee. No apology you can make now will ever erase that." he affirmed, almost as though the big man couldn't believe it, both the fact that he'd been there when Lee had dragged Rian into the hospital after she'd been impaled on a dagger seven years ago, and a candid, instant conclusion of how this might have come to be crossing his mind.

"Could have killed your own child." Neji added, eager to heap an extra smear of guilt atop his teammate's already towering pile of woes. He dared not smile, not in the face of what the couple could have lost. And already had lost.

Numb with shock, Lee lowered his steeled jaw until he could stare at the head Rian had turned away from him in a silent display of distrust. Gai gave a small nod, eyes frozen to the ground as Rian reached up, clasping her sensei's head. A reassuring squeeze of fingers later, Gai stepped back, leaving Rian to stand alone.

In the space of a few seconds, Rian suddenly seemed smaller than he could remember: too small to be bearing his ungrateful student's child, too small to carry the weight of a strained marriage, too small to be battered and bruised on the inside even more than the outside.

Too small to have a broken heart so early in life.

Part of being a guardian was letting your fledglings go when they sprouted their wings. They had to learn to fly on their own, Mother Nature ruled. But, it was heartbreaking to watch Rian's wings be clipped, and watch her plummet downwards and out of his reach.

However, none of this sadness was betrayed as Gai stepped back, letting his adopted student stray a little further from his comforting circle of arms. Oh, well. They would always be open, should she need a place to hide from the world. Any time, anywhere.

A fallen protector, Lee suddenly felt soiled. Tainted. Unfit to be even involved in this new life he had created. This child was a product of love, and there was no love in this room; There was only a steeled determination trying to see who would be the first one to shed tears.

How could they go on, after he'd shattered their family in such a way, shattered Rian's trust in him? How could he face being a father with knowing that he had struck out so violently against it's mother? How could he somehow piece together the broken pieces of his family, and all the while prepare for an addition to it?

The future seemed a yawning abyss that had opened up beneath his feet in the course of a few minutes. The world once crazy with promise was now insanely dark and terrifying with no possibility for repair, hairline fractures skewering the horizon he had once looked to.

And all of this- was his fault.

And he thought his old load of guilt was enough.

"This will never, ever, happen again." he swore, trying to somehow begin to sort out all the words he wanted to spill onto Rian's ears, even if they were unhearing. He was more sorry than anything he had ever been in life. How could he prove that to her, and ease this burden that threatened to crush him from the intensity.

"And I'm supposed to believe that!?"

Scalded with the anger seething inside of her, Rian finally spat some of her own venom back at him. She felt him squirm, anger numbing any sympathy she might have felt for this monster.

Now, it was her turn to speak. Compared to the distrust sprouting in Neji, Gai, and Tenten, the reminder that he'd decimated the one he kept closest to his heart would be the toppling blow. She'd felt the knife in her back-Now, it was his turn for punishment.

Spinning on her heel, Rian detachedly caught the mixtures of accusation and empathy marinating her teammate and teacher's expressions, countenances- unlofty glances. They understood; They wouldn't reject her, or hurt her if she tore Lee apart as much as he had her. In fact, their hollow airs were quite egging her on.

"All those years of telling me you loved me! All those miniscule little promises and those kisses- How credible are they, Lee? How do I trust your flowery little words, again, hm?"

His silence, hands held on either side of his head and expression stunned, only gunned the ignition for a release of the uncertainty and flaming terror that was smoldering within her.

"How do I believe that all those 'I love you's', and every time you promised to give your life for mine- How do I believe you any more? What trust haven't you destroyed, with your little temper tantrum? You **hate** me! Y-you hurt me, not only with physical injuries, but with your words, too- 'Worthless container of a monster', I quote. But, but that's a mere trifling compared to what you did- with those hands." she sniffled, voice curling in disgust.

"How can I trust you, not to do this again, and how can I ever believe anything you promise me again, after you've destroyed the world you built up on your own words?"

Feeling a pell of anger welling at the base of her throat, it took a growl and a clenching of fists in the empty, fog-clustered, gaze-bored room, before she could truly begin to eject the emotion that had built above everything else that night.

"How can I trust you to protect me, and our child-" she spat through gritted teeth, stabbing angrily at the life within her with one finger, than at Lee's slumping, suddenly not so strong in appearance's chest as cold anger flooded up her arm.

"-When you're the biggest threat to us!?"

The question seemed to crackle as it hung in the air, sending the dead atmosphere of the room galvanizing to life. Silence, however, quickly killed the phrase, and the curdling sensation so strong that the wallpaper might have begun to peel. Every eye riveted to his spine-splintered back, the possibilities of how the evening might end burst from their trickle of thoughts into a tumbling, cascading waterfall of- God, he loved her so much.

"I.. I'm so.. Sorry…" he sniffled, voice high and small, nearly inaudible without the silence that was killing him accenting the words. The room seemed to press down on his back, his lungs- It was nearly impossible to breathe, let alone huff a word of how deeply he felt. Two times in his life had he ever felt so much emotion; One was on an off-road path near the edge of the village, with a teenaged Rian ready to walk out of his life forever. And the other was on the Hyuuga's foyer floor, with chary and disbelieving glances of hate tracing his back, demanding an explanation for his iniquity when there was none.

Nothing louder than Neji sneering permitting him from speaking further, Lee forced the words from his lips and hoped that his mind could connect what he wanted to say into what left his mouth.

".. I just, I was- You were, just there and- And, I-"

Lee's head bobbed up, desperately meeting Rian's distaste-antenatal gaze. The Green Beast in him had displaced the Beast of his anger, and there was now, truly, only a heart-broken, love-lorn Rock Lee before her, standing in the face of losing everything he truly loved, truly contrite and conscious of the wrongdoings he'd committed.

Why didn't he, the question came once more, but in much different light. Why didn't he explain to her why he was spending so much time behind his scrolls? Why didn't he come out of the back room and hugged her, just because he loved her? Why hadn't he talked to her, told her what was troubling him- they were married! That's what they were supposed to do. Why hadn't he accepted a shoulder to lean on when he'd needed it?

Why was he so stupid?

"And, I will never again let my anger make those I love out to be enemies, when they are only trying to help me. I barbarously reacted out of rage- Rian, you, you have to understand- I was angry wi-with myself- And that's why I was- I'm too weak. It's my fault, what happened wi-with Hidan- If I'd have been there, he couldn't have- I just hated myself, for harming you. I thought if I could just become stronger, I could protect you- And than I- I turn around and-"

A hardened lump finally muscled itself down Lee's throat. With a gulp, he continued. Was it his imagination, or were the venomous gazes losing some of their sting?

"I don't know, how you can ever trust me again. But, if you do decide- to give me a chance, I-I will make things, better. For the three of us."

A sniffle that would have been humorously labeled 'pathetic' in less dire circumstances punctured the etherous quality of the room. Lee's sable hair shifted with a gentle scratch, his head bowing with the weight of Rian's chariness against him.

"I-I am, not worthy of your trust, Rian-Chan. You have every right to hate me, and to disbelieve every word I say. But, I will change- Starting right now. Fo-for you, I swear. I will never, ever raise a hand against you, or our child, if you choose to allow me back into your life. The, the only way you can ever trust me again, is if I can prove myself to you. But, I just need a chance to do that-"

Gazing at the floorboards, Lee realized than how fruitless his speech had been. Maybe he could just walk out the door now, before she rebuked him forever and banished him from her touch. God, how would he live without her?- The possibility was all-consuming, and frighteningly realistic.

And staring him in the face.

"This will never, ever, happen again." he found himself whispering, the words peeling from the shredded remains of what he could recognize as his heart. She had to hear him, understand- He loved her. He did. With all his- She would never believe him. He'd lost her. And his child. All in a few seconds of anger against himself.

"It better not." Tenten interjected, her voice pregnant with repose.

"Because if you ever lay a single finger on her again-" She stabbed in the direction of Rian's torso.

"-I'll kill you on the spot." Neji hissed, spittle spraying the back of Lee's neck.

He jumped visibly, flinching at the sensation. Lee had nothing more to lose; Why shouldn't he show that forbidden Shinobi threat: emotions? There was nothing on the face of God's earth he could do to further incriminate himself. At least tonight.

With a long sigh, Rian finally turned to face her contrite husband. He couldn't even bring himself to meet her eyes when she did, flinching in preparation to hear his sentence. He didn't even dare glance at the swelling show of the life within her on her belly, the first sign that his child, _his _child, was truly growing. He was unworthy to even look at her, after what he'd done. Perhaps he should just slip out the door and spirit home to pack a bag- surely, she didn't want him around her any longer, and Lee wasn't all too sure if he wanted to meet the shattered remnants of their once-happy life there. She had no reason to trust him; Why would she allow him into what was once _their _home?

What was once. The words thudded into him like a kunai to the heart. He even flinched with the impact.

"We need to get home, Lee." Rian exhaled, sounding absolutely fatigued, both by the ordeal and the fact that there was now something squashing all of her organs together from the inside.

At this, Tenten began to step forward to stop her friend. What was Rian, insane!? This man just beat her, and she was going home with him- She couldn't have actually believed Lee's silvery promises and flowery words- No woman in her right mind would return to the lion's den so soon after suffering such an evening as she had.

"Rian." she rasped, trying to open the words from the canned seal within her mind. But, when Rian turned to face her, all she could do was see past the steeled glint in her eyes and hug her close once more; this time, as a mother-to-mother embrace. She felt her best friend shift in her stance, obviously taken aback by the desperation in her embrace. The hand on Rian's abdomen was crushed between Tenten's taut, full stomach, and her own barely-showing, emaciated display of the child she was carrying as the mother of three tried to squeeze her distraction for Rian's lot into a hug.

"_Please_ come by, first thing tomorrow." she pleaded, only loud enough for Rian alone to hear.

She felt Rian's hand fist around the back of her shirt with uncertainty, the mask of intolerant forbearance slipping loose for a single moment.

"I will." came the murmer of a response that was to reassure Tenten that all would be well between her teammates.

It's wasn't enough.

And suddenly, Rian was gone, slipping out the door with a defeated Lee following at her heels like a beaten dog. Outside the window, the sun was just beginning to rise over the mountains bordering the Leaf, the yellow and orange beams crazy-bright with promise of a new day for the inhabitants of the Shinobi village.

For Rian and Lee, it was the first step on a journey of a thousand miles.

"I'll keep my eyes on her." was all Gai stated, before he slid out onto the dew-wet sidewalk, wondering if Anko would mind joining him for a drink at such an hour. The door slammed, and suddenly, there were just the Caged Bird of the Hyuuga, his sleeping daughter, and the slouched, defeated form of Tenten standing in the foyer, all together and yet all alone.

And Neji felt the tears damming in her eyes even without looking at her.

"It's OK, baby. Even ninja can." he said soothingly, before reaching for the strands of thick, earth-colored hair to stroke comfortingly. He didn't need to say that he would be joining her. It went unspoken, much like many relationship-altering events. They'd built their family on silent communications of love; Rian and Lee had destroyed their's with the same naught for words.

And so, Tenten and Neji began their day with a good, long cry in each other's arms, Kei napping blissfully unaware at the junction of their chests as her parent's tears plittered to her tiny, hair-patched head.

**A/N: This chapter dedicated to my cousin Chelsea- for dumping her good boyfriend and going back to the one that only wants One Thing. I hope those birth-control pills are as bitter as your life will be.**


	6. On The Way Down

**Author's Note: Here it goes- Isn't it terrible that I'm going to rebuild their relationship a little bit, and than utterly and completely tear it into itty bitty pieces? -snort- I'm so evil. I'm an evil angst writer with a toy skull that squeaks and's eyes bug out when you squeeze it. -squeezes Tim Skeleton for inspiration-**

**Uh, yeah. They're going to get back together... For a while.**

**A special 'Thank You' to all of the comfort and response the last chapter got. I feel much better knowing that there are so many of you out there who know mine and my family's pain. A special thanks and a prayer for every one of you.**

Lee woke up the next morning, reaching over in the half-conscious throes of sleep to grope at his side for the warm, pajama-clad pile of silken skin that was usually snuggled against his chest during the night hours.

His hand slapped at the empty, cold sheets for a full minute before his eyes popped open in realization.

The ratty blanket in a lump on the couch Rian had resigned herself to was folded on the arm of the sofa, and no evidence that his wife had even been there was left. She'd obviously made out before he'd woken up, apparently feeling it unnecessary to warn him that she was leaving.

A colander was sitting in the kitchen sink when he reached it, and a few uncooked egg noodles, like the vanquished heads of an enemy stuck on poles outside a medieval castle, lay scattered across the counter. Yes, Rian had been there. Egg noodles were her favorite food.

He brushed the dried remnants of her breakfast into the trash can, and caught himself wishing that he could brush away what he'd done just as easily. Rian might have trusted him enough to share an apartment with him, but that was trivial. The distrust was still evident, stinging like a slap.

But than, how much did he really expect her to trust him?

The next week was sheer torture. The journey of a thousand miles began with one step, or so they said, and Lee's first step was to reestablish the fact to Rian that he did indeed, still love her.

He'd remembered what he'd called her: He'd known, even in a fit of anger, that those words would pierce her like no others could. Worthless container of a monster. When the words would cross his mind, like a marquee, Lee would pause whatever he was doing and rip himself apart on the inside. He repeated to himself how much he hated what he'd done, and consequentially hated himself, that the words had become a bit repetitive, and extremely well-heard. How could he have said that to her? What kind of malicious, selfish pervert had he been, to undermine and fondle her emotions like that?

Well, he knew one thing. He was not that person who had hurt her in that way. He was Rock Lee, and he would prove to his Rian that one explosion didn't have to end their entire relationship. Their roots went deeper than that, and their love was strong enough to survive a suffering like this. He would spend the rest of his life retributing that incident, if he had to. She just had to know; he still loved her, and would never, ever, raise a hand or a sharp word to her again.

So, he figured the best thing to do was to make up for all of the hate that had been present in those desperate minutes first.

It was very, very hard to fill in the holes he'd created.

Just as well, Rian made proving his unchanged affection very, very difficult. When he would try to hug her from behind in that way that she used to always love, in a flash of brown, she would duck beneath his circle of arms and continue about her business. If he tried to snuggle her when they both had dropped on the couch with exhaustion, she would shove him away and go find something to fill her time with. When he would place a gentle kiss on her cheek, he'd feel her tense away from him, her face contorting into a scowl beneath his lips. Tributary offerings of her favorite food grew cold as they sat untouched on the kitchen table. Rian resigned herself to the couch, never even glancing at the two's room. He found the little notes he left on the counter for her shredded like shaved coconut in the bathroom trashcan.

He wondered countless times how they would survive that first week. He even considered the frightening possibility that maybe they would break up, learn to live without each other. Maybe even find new Precious People to love.

The thought scared him beyond all reason. The terrifying prospect of some other man teaching his child how to throw a kunai, of spotting Rian clasping the arm of someone else, or of Sakura flirting with him was unbearable. Every night without her snuggled against his side, he would fall asleep with terrifying images of a life without her ruling his mind. He was like a phantom, floating through his days with his mind on the face he missed more than anything itself. Everywhere he looked was a painful reminder of the woman he loved, and the way that her distrust, though perfectly justifiable, made him feel. He swore to himself that he would stand this emotional torture, and somehow make up for this, this tangled wreckage he'd made of their trust. He would be stronger than her doubts and fears: He would prove that he still loved her with every fiber of his being, and was not the monster of his anger any more. But every time she refused to meet his eyes, his resistance died a little more.

And just when he'd given up all hope, unable to lock himself away in missions and training any longer and ready to break down and tell her that he was moving out, he'd woken up in the wee hours of the morning to find her snuggled in the crook of his arm, just like she always had before the incident.

Women were funny creatures, sometimes. Rian just needed some room to grow into this new stage of their relationship, he supposed. But, she'd seen him hang in there through the thick and thin, and he'd managed to pass the first milestone to forgiveness: He had proved that he was still a dedicated husband.

Things rapidly began to get better from that point on. Now, she was attacking him when he came through the front door, leaving little notes tied to his tooth brush in the mornings, and even leaving a bowl of egg noodles out for him, little reminders that he had _won_, and defeated that small arm of her fears. As it was with true love, it was impossible for them to stay angry at each other for too long, no matter how grave the offence. For some, this blatant reliance could have been deathly. But for someone who realized in full what he'd done and was working over time to right it, like Lee, and Rian, who was remembering how to trust and receiving every signal of Lee's contrition, it was a recipe for success, and another nail in the support beams that would rebuild their relationship. But it was acted upon silently, with Rian every so often hinting that the level of confidence that she had in him was rising, never giving him enough of her heart all at once, lest he lash out and destroy it. She wasn't sure enough yet that he wouldn't revert to his previous way of treating her, and it was a huge dent in the reliance she held in him: Her safety net had a hole in it, and she wasn't sure how many times she could fall back against it and not fall through.

This undercurrent of distrust manifested itself in many ways. For every two steps forward, they took one back. Rian wasn't her usually joking, loving self, replaced by a shuffling, shifty-eyed doppleganger of her past self. She only addressed him aloud when he was paying full attention to her, and seemed to be searching into his soul through his eyes when she did speak to him. She'd stiffen with terror if he caught her off-guard in an embrace, and if Lee seemed even mildly annoyed with something, she would make herself scarce until he reassured her that everything was alright. When they were home alone, she was flighty, and was careful not to sneak up on him, lest he accidentally strike out at her. When she did lunge away from a movement she caught out of the corner of her eye, her hands would fly to her abdomen, arms crisscrossing a shield over the life growing in her stomach. These were just precautions, she told herself, watching the hurt shadow in Lee's eyes. Just precautions, even though her uncharacteristic defensiveness of her personal space perturbed her as much as it did everyone around her.

Every time she would flinch away from his touch, the malingering pain of what he'd done would strike him again like the surest of shruiken. Every day was another mile walked, another mountain conquered, another finishing tape broken, he knew. But, it was the periods in between the mile markers and mountaintops that were killing them.

Maybe Rian returned to trusting Lee so soon, because he was all she had. Despite his contriteness, there had been a breach of the trust between them that could never fully be repaired. So, Rian watched Lee with all the distrust of a beaten animal, trying to convince herself that she could, once again, entrust herself to him after the fright he'd given her. He'd betrayed her in a frighteningly familiar way, and she could never, ever make her forget that night. For a few, fleeting instants, Lee had been terrifyingly powerful, beating her underneath his thumb like the cruelest of dictators she alone had had to suffer.

For a few, fleeting instants, she was sure she'd seen Neko-Chan in his eyes.

Lee bore the silent periods with all the ease of one truly sorrowed for what he had done, because he was. He'd had to teach Rian how to trust and love after she'd lost Neko-Chan. Now, he had just undone a huge amount of her learning by betraying her in this way, if only for a moment. Screaming at her was one thing. Hitting her was another. Lee had been raised better than that, he knew, averting his gaze whenever Gai would give him a poisonous look. He'd shamed himself, and- he had run out of words to describe the despicable action he seemed to spend every ounce of his concentration attempting to forget. Sometimes Lee wished that someone could start him over again from scratch, and clean him of the tarnish that he'd slathered himself in; clean off Rian's trust for him, shine Gai's somewhat standoffishness to it's original, almost hysterical delight in him, and scour the clinging refuse from Neji and Tenten's eyes. But, he knew that the only person who could do such a thing was him, by regaining their respect and digging another handhold in their trust.

In the face of losing the trust of his teammates and mentor, Lee was, fully taking to heart the lesson he had learned, looking forward. Even if this had only happened once, it would never happen again. Lee had undergone an amazing, sterilizing transmutation in those few, desperate minutes. He was now more dedicated than ever to the greatest mission he had ever been blessed to complete (and the one he had never thought of considering as a 'duty'): being a steadfast, loving husband. Being there for Rian, he smugly thought, was more important than protecting her from physical harm. Those were the bridges he'd just have to cross when he got to them; For now, duty called for throwing caution to the wind, and continuing to balance protecting those he loved with loving those he protected. There were two lives depending on him, now, and he had to step up to the plate and be a real man.

Luckily, there was always one thing that could make him forget, if only for a single second, all about the past's conflicts.

Every time he would press a hand to her stomach as though to make sure it were really happening, and not some wonderful fantasy he'd conjured up for them, a genuine smile would flitter across his face. And, when Rian returned that grin, he always thought he would just burst with joy.

Gai was continually bitch-slapping him for daydreaming during training, but Lee just couldn't help it. He couldn't wait to show his child how to fling a shruiken, and how to sound out the words to his last name. He could practically feel five little fingers wrapping themselves around his index one, practically imagine the weight of a dimpled fist in his hand as his child balanced against him in preparation for his first steps. He could imagine all the stupid things he would do to make it smile, all the missions he would show up for covered in drool and regurgitated peas, all the planning sessions he would nod off during because of colicking and teething. It all seemed like a beautiful dream come true, one that he had never even dared envision. And now, he was going to be a father, right alongside the woman he loved most in the world. 3 a.m feedings, dirty diapers, solid foods, scraped knees, childproof locks on all the cabinets- The future was grimy, and smelled like baby food, but it was a beautiful one none the less. A better one than he deserved.

But, here they were, three months into the Family Way thing, and still alive. And the more his wife's stomach began to bulge, the more her trust in him seemed to increase.

That was another joy that came with this fluke of fate; The stress of keeping up the secret that had been weighing on Rian was lifted away, and he could see the bright and sparkling reflection of the woman he loved in her face once more. Their tarnished relationship seemed to suddenly be cleaned to a hilt, the problems seeming to mend themselves as, slowly, Rian turned to trust her husband again. And one day, it was as though the whole incident had never happened. The sparkle was back in her olive eyes, and like a wilting flower placed back underneath the sun, she began to flourish once again. Jokes abounded once more, chortling smiles found their way back onto her face, and Rian could suddenly embrace him without fear, and not startle and scream if he playfully slapped her on the backside with a dish towel. That was almost as wonderful as the prospect of passing on a contribution to the next generation.

The future just seemed to stretch in front of the two with promise and the joy only bringing a new life into the world could bestow.

Gai was in on the act, too, Lee would smugly think when he caught the man driving Anko up the walls with hopelessly premature bragging about his "pseudo grandchild". Gai was a treasure trove of information about pregnant women, some of which facts sent Lee into hair-tearing fits of anxiety, but the man was also a good place for Lee to vent his private frustrations, his feelings of inadequacy, the way he sometimes felt Rian and his's relationship was still coming loose at the seams, and his never-ending cycle of worries about the job of becoming a parent and somehow still fulfilling his dream- read, obsession- with becoming a splendid ninja. Gai was always there, passively nodding every so often, and always ready to hug him like he was still a teenager having his hopes and dreams shattered. The need for a father figure to learn from had suddenly increased, and the odd Jounin known as Maito Gai, as usual, was Lee's model for the situation. Gai was just glad to have Lee back under his wing, and to be able to talk the stress out of the young man before it manifested itself in a fit of rage.

And even though he knew it wasn't good for her, sometimes Lee would just have to poke Rian awake at night to ask her one more question, or to make known one more of his irrational fears. Because, after all, Gai-sensei didn't know everything. I mean, he wasn't the one who was swollen up like a hippopotamus with a gland problem. (That particular metaphor got Lee a one-way ticket to "Sleeping On The Couch For A Week"-land, by the way.)

You see, like most new parents, sometime after the bliss of being told that he was going to be a daddy set in, the second onset of parental temperament changes struck him down like a speeding semi: paranoia.

He wondered how Rian stayed so calm about the whole matter: in truth, he was the one getting more upset over the little problems than she was. She would always patiently, but in a fatigued growl, answer his nighttime distrusts, including the ever popular, "Oh-My-God-What-If-It-Hates-Me?" argument Lee had with himself almost constantly.

With quiet reassurances, she answered the stupid questions he would ask, completely freaking him out when she would calmly answer some with "Hmm.. I don't know..", and listened to him talk to the new voices inside his head about what kind of ninja endeavor this little one might choose. She even seemed mildly (read, mildly) tolerant when Gai would approach her in the street, slap a hand to her abdomen (usually causing Lee to have an absolute fit; you could hurt the thing by hitting it too hard, couldn't you?), and loudly ask for a status check on the "fruit of his youthful student's loins".

Still, there was something in his prenatal joy that he happened to overlook. Rian was going through a change, and it was cleverly masked by the symptoms of her pregnancy and her jovial attitude. He'd catch a flash in her eye at ever-shortening intervals, but stupidly told himself that it was nothing, and go on with his day. He wanted so badly to believe that things would be alright and that the last of their problems were done, that he brainwashed himself into believing he'd seen nothing: that Rian was herself, he was okay, and life was going to be just fine. In fact, better than fine. He wanted to believe that there were no more secrets between him and Rian, that she didn't think that he would ever lash out at her again, that he could be an upstanding father figure to this new life. He drilled every fiber of self-confidence he had in him into keeping this belief going, feeling the yawning jaws of uncertainty lapping abbarently at his feet.

But, no matter how many castles in the air he built for himself, it wasn't to be. Rian was still keeping something from him, though masking her symptoms better, for fear of the same reaction. This, this just couldn't be- Her child couldn't have come from such beginnings. It scalded her to think that only time would tell if this manipulative, despicable monster had had his way with her once more, and that she might already owe a blood contract to the force that had given her this child.

Each time she felt her anger well up at the leering creature within her, averted eyes and deep breaths would spirit the fury away for a few hours. She couldn't afford to let anyone know. She couldn't stress Lee out with this maybe-fate of the child he was so enthralled with. He was too happy, too at ease for her to break their new-found peace. She couldn't bring herself to destroy their happiness again.

And besides, maybe she'd lose it, like she hoped.

If only Lee had recognized when the truth was being concealed from him.

The months wore on, and the Hyuugas were hit with a double whammy- twins. Hizashi and Mikami were the third and fourth prodigies of the Hyuuga's Cadet branch, and all the more welcome, therefore. Naruto was inaugurated as Orochidaime Hokage after Kakashi respectfully retired from the title, and the Leaf signed a treaty with Kirigakure, sending many of it's finest Shinobi to aid the war torn country, and, in turn, buying the country's trust and alliance forever. Akatsuki had disappeared for the time being, it seemed, and, as it happened, Lee did exceptionally well on a mission to protect a daimyo's wife, and got his Village a gigantic bonus with the country of Snow.

It all seemed too perfect for Lee. A family in progress, the greatest wife on the planet, a Shinobi name revered, an Anbu team that was blossoming, in spite of their lack of leader, and his entire life ahead of him with brilliant promise.

It all seemed just too blissfully wonderful to believe.

Which usually meant it was.

As I said, something was bound to go wrong, because everything was going so well.

The Rocks' little picture of a future was shattered when Rian went into labor two months premature.

Lee got the message halfway home from an Anbu mission with his group. Well, not really "a message", in the form of an official letter, or a runner throwing an envelope at him. It was more of when he was bending over to stuff a blood-soaked jumpsuit into his pack, a queer shiver, unlike anything he'd ever felt before in his entire life, shuddered up his back and the first though that leapt to mind was: "Something's wrong".

The entire trip home, he'd been rattled and jumpy, but he hadn't known how serious it was until he'd reached the Village gates, his cell plodding behind him, complaining under their breaths about how Lee had ordered them to make it back without any breaks or stops along the way, which Sachi took upon herself to moan about the entire way back.

The feeling had returned, and had only increased in intensity as he went tearing through the streets of the Village, zoomed up the stoop of their apartment building, thundered past his neighbors, dug through his pants for the house key, and flung open the door so hard that the doorknob left a hole in the wall behind it.

He'd wanted the entire way there to deny the sensation rippling up and down his body. He'd wanted to deny it more than anything on the planet.

But, the evidence was there, in front of his eyes: Or, more appropriately, underneath his feet.

There was a huge puddle of crusted blood scraping into the soles of his sandals, and the apartment was empty.

A mad dash to the Hospital had been met with Sakura's jade eyes from across the lobby. Unfortunately, they were half-slitted with a mixture of sympathy and sorrow. She hated to see the young ones be faced with such a hopeless situation, really. Especially the children of her friends. It just didn't seem fair, really, especially to a couple like Rian and Lee. They had so much joy, so much hope for their little one.

His stomach bottoming out, Lee, still clad in his blood-crusted Black Op gauntlets and chest plate, had been led into the ICU, where he was too terrified to even open his eyes, for fear of what he might see.

Fortunately, he was met with Rian practically throwing herself onto him from where she'd been pacing the length of the Hospital room, much thinner and suddenly much, much lighter, with dark magenta bags under her eyes. He'd been so happy to see her that he had only been able to cling to his wife for a few minutes, utterly silent, feeling her melt into his embrace and rubbing comforting circles in her thin shoulders.

Their little happy moment was interrupted with Tsunade's holler echoing up and down the hallways. She burst into Rian's hospital room a minute later, one fist pumping the air triumphantly as she pursed her painted lips.

The aging medic had been waging a battle for life that had lasted the entire five hours the child had been alive. Lee had arrived just in time for the good news: His son, who had died twice during the emergency Caesarean section that had brought him into the world, was an extremely premature 1 pound and 7 ounces, closely resembled a monkey, and had oodles and oodles of black hair. And his daddy's nose.

Rock Ryoto, first and only child of Rock Lee and Nibi No Rian, was given no more than a 45 chance of survival, at best, though. Even though Tsunade had her well-founded doubts, she could only nod to the strained expression of Gai's usually-jovial, look-alike student that the child that meant more than life to Lee could pull through his premature birth, and learn to breathe on his own through his underdeveloped lungs. To Rian's face, however, she couldn't lie: It was a good thing there were other injuries in her hospital to attend to, or Tsunade might have jut sat down and let her iron will melt for the couple in the form of a handful of tears. She hated watching children die, more than any part of her occupation. Innocence was to be nurtured, not destroyed or killed. That was the whole clinching factor in the royally screwed justice system of Shinobi life. Purity and blamelessness should be protected, cherished. In the form of a child, an untested, unscathed vial of guiltlessness should be nurtured so that it could live.

However, she was bitter and numb- or so she told herself. The thing would die like everything else, and that would be the end of it. She would just have to tell herself that. Former Hokage didn't despair at the hopelessness of their existences, nor the worlds they lived in.

Even so, Tsunade wasn't surprised the next morning when she found the crumpled form of a premature baby, sleeping peacefully within the confines of his incubator as Sakura stroked his tiny, sunken chest with a single finger. She'd known he would pull through, she'd mulled as she chewed on a strand of blonde hair and twiddled a ball-point pen on her fingers. Something was keeping this baby alive, and it wasn't just his will to live.

Mother and kiddo were kept a few days in the Hospital for observation, all of which time Lee was trying to weasel his way into getting his hands on his son. The first time he did, though, he was absolutely terrified that he'd move the wrong way and shatter this fragile little pile of silky skin and raven hair. His calloused hands, which had never seemed rugged enough, suddenly were too strong to hold such a precious, tiny little creature, he thought. All the hopes and dreams he could have prayed for- and like so many of the wonderful, wonderful things in life, it was delicate, and could break at his smallest movement. However, after gaining a rudimentary knowledge of how not to suffocate his child, it was very hard for Sakura to convince this eager father to relinquish his son to her care.

A week after his mother's dischargement, Rock Ryoto was brought (in his father's arms, naturally.) back to the shoebox of an apartment that was his home, now with a makeshift crib squashed inbetween a couple of boxes and the couch.

But, a clueless Lee had been too enthralled in his infant offspring to notice the looks Rian, Tsunade, and Sakura had exchanged. And just once, before he'd been dragged off to his new home, Tsunade had traced the little black cloud marks surrounding Ryoto's navel with her fingertip.

The dreaded prediction had come true. Somehow, it was hard to stay as thrilled as Lee was, with this heavy knowledge weighing on all of their minds.

But, they didn't tell a soul. Now, it was only four people who knew the secret of the Rock's little progeny.

Or, should we say, three people and one cat.

* * *

"Geez, Lee. Will you leave the poor child alone? Being born is a big deal, and he needs his rest."

Lee had been leaning gingerly over the edge of his son's crib for- Rian's eyes slid over to the clock on the microwave as the hissing pan in front of her spat a droplet of boiling water onto her arm. An hour and ten minutes. Shaking her head woefully, the brunette poked at the Instant Ramen sizzling on the stovetop in front of her with a steak prong, as though she expected the cake of uncooked noodles to leap up and bite her.

Grinning stupidly at the pudgy, dimpled face a foot below his, her raven haired husband chuckled and bit back a reply.

"But he likes lookin' at his daddy! Don't ya, guy?" Lee asked in a playful, chipmunk-like voice, waggling the finger he had conveniently dangling a few inches from Ryoto's fat little fingers. A squeal peeled from the throat of the small creature, who had only recently discovered that he had vocal cords, and had not shut up since.

Serious. Lee had scanned every parenting book he could find, and they affirmed he and his wife's suspicion. This child was _not_ supposed to be talking this much. The sounds of babbling, spitting, crying, and drool bubbles being blown filled the nights… Every single one of them. The child jabbered on like a monkey in a tree every waking instant that he wasn't asleep, which was, quite annoyingly, very often.

Swiping his arms as though he didn't know just what they were for, little Ryoto would stare passively at his dimpled fists, all the while chattering to them. He talked when anybody approached him, and when nobody was around. He tried to jabber through his bottle, usually getting more formula on Rian and Lee than he did in his mouth. Gibbering at ungodly hours of the night, Rian and Lee would throw his little back venomous glances through their raccoon eyes when he did catnap, mostly because they were jealous of how he got to sleep whenever he wanted to.

So, due in no small part to their son's excessive need to make himself heard, Rian and Lee had officially crossed the line. They were no longer parents. They were zombies with responsibilities.

Lee was practically sleepwalking through missions, and had conveniently learned to snooze standing up, one foot tilted backwards like a kickstand. This was actually rather comical to watch, as Kura and Sachi had observed. Mostly because Lee talked in his sleep, and the conversations he carried could be recorded and used as blackmail.

So, half-awake and mistaking formula for half-and-half (THAT was an interesting cup of coffee.. ), Rian and Lee had managed to muddle their way through their first two and a half months of parenthood.

Wonderful. Only eighteen years and three hundred and five days left.

"Well, while he's looking at you, would you mind handin' him this?" she added, before hacky-sacking a bottle of formula over her head and sending it arcing toward the back of Lee's head. Reaching up with a lighting-fast reflex, Lee caught the warm plastic just before it thwacked him in the blind spot, without even looking up from the fat little face of his infant son.

"You two will be getting the chance to spend some real time together for the next few days, I guess." Rian said, opening the floor for the much-discussed debate that had been circling the Rock household.

Scowling in mid-swipe, Lee swooped a nattering, sable-haired Ryoto securely into the cradle of his arms, before plopping down in a chair to feed the noisy invader of his home.

The room was pleasantly punctured with only the most homey of noises, and the smell of raspberry air freshener was light and pungent as the dust mites danced in the single sunbeam patching the floor from the window. Tiny body leaning fragilely against Lee's arm, a drool-saturated, pajama-clad Ryoto cooed happily, before silencing himself for a few minutes of nourishment.

"I don't like you going on this mission without me.." Lee broke the passive silence by stating, narrowing his eyes as Ryoto began to slurp a little louder than necessary at the end of the bottle. Lee actually liked feeding his son, even when the boy managed to somehow splatter his dad with the formula mess Rian made him drink. God, how did Ryoto get this stuff close enough to his mouth to eat? It was positively pungent…

Dropping the steak prong against the metal stovetop for emphasis, Rian twirled on her heel and slapped the utensil back into her palm as the two adult's eyes met.

"Look. Someone has to watch Pookey there, and every eligible person who won't feed him to the lions is out on a mission this week besides,.. Well, you know."

Lee's teeth clattered together audibly as a shiver rippled up his body. How could Sachi even _think_ for a _moment_ that he would **_ever_** leave his son in her care? She'd eagerly offered her 'services' to a horrified Lee a few days ago, and he had nearly choked on air at the extension of her ignorant proposition. The thought of the hyperactive, preppy teen watching his offspring for seven straight days sent chills up his spine. Being a father was hard enough on him and Rian, two against one. What chance did one ignorant, childish teenaged prep stand against, (here he mentally added some cheesy horror music), .. _the Ryoto_? Not only that, but in his personal experience, any small amount of hardship placed in front of Sachi was met with enough griping and complaining to turn one's liver green. God only knows how miserable she would make everyone with the duty of watching a loud, drooling baby on her shoulders. Tongue firmly in cheek, he had managed to hiss a 'Thanks, but no thanks', much to the girl's disappointment.

"Alright. You've made your point. I just don't like being where I can't watch over you, is all."

Scunching his lower lip, Lee's eyes met those of his emerald eyed child as the baby's bleary vision focused on his face, black strands of bangs already straining to brush his moggy eyes. It almost wasn't fair to Rian, really. Ryoto already had his father's shining, jet black hair, caramel skin, and buggy, mosquito eyes. Dandelion-silk eyelashes were already becoming visibly darker in the lower corners of his eyes: Three, just like Lee's. His dimpled, chibi face was still pudgy, but it was clear that he'd probably have Lee's chin, too.

Well, at least he had his mommy's eyes, Lee lamented contently. Ryoto's eyes were the cat-like, olive verdant of Rian's, slanted in the corners with a visible reminder of-.. Well. Neither of them liked to think about that, much. This was a new life, a new family, and a new beginning; there wasn't room for old demonic cats with a taste for blood. Ryoto was more than a child. He was the promise of a new existence to replace the old one, the one that had hidden his identity for years, betraying Rian's trust only to threaten the village. Of all the contesters and threats against her, none was greater than the mere mention of her childhood friend's name. That was one thing Lee could never protect her from, no matter how much he loved her and how many attempts at trying to understand his wife and Neko-Chan's previous relationship. But now, they had a break from their old routine, and could finally escape the continual shadow of the Nibi that seemed forever draped over Rian's shoulders.

And very slowly, the pain the cat had caused would be buried in the sands of time, never to resurface.

Rian's lip curled up, nearly revealing a slighty pointed incisor as it did. The sizzling ramen splattering broth onto her ratty blue sweater was about done, she supposed, and she slid across the kitchen for a couple of bowls. Well, at least with a baby around, they were having to clean their home up a little more. Normally, she would have had to step over a dozen and a half piles of empty pie tins and garbage to get to the cabinet. No army could run in disorder, and there was certainly a war against Fatigue going on within the confines of their home. A minimum of clean up, at least; just enough so that at 3 a.m. feedings, they weren't falling flat on their faces after tripping over piles of random crap.

"Yeah. I understand." she said, her tone knowing.

Lee gazed smugly over at Rian's back, half-smiling as Ryoto slurked the last of the formula into his mouth. Yeah. She did understand.

It seemed like forever since he'd collapsed the far wall by throwing her into it, and so long since that fear had been there. Time had washed away the tears and the terror, beautiful redemption blossoming from the cracked remains of the trauma. Where there was once horror, there was trust. Where there had been anger, there was love.

It was hard to think that there had ever been a time that their relationship might have fallen apart. Rian and Lee had been together as long as time, it seemed; They'd been childhood teammates, muddled through puberty as canoodling hormone baskets, and became adults as a married couple. They were one of the long-standing things in Konoha, it seemed. Always together, through the wind and the rain, in this world that they couldn't rise above. They were one of the things that "stayed", and never changed. There was always a chest for Rian to be hugged to, and always a shoulder for Lee to cry on. That was what kept them alive every minute of the violent pantomime they existed in- having the other to fight for, to live for, to be loved by. Love was a power greater than any dedication they could offer their country, and it could only be given to each other. It was beautiful, really. Something so innocent in a world that took purity, beat it, killed it, burned it and scattered it's ashes into the wind.

And to think, he could have lost that in a moment of rage.

You know, maybe if they had both just been able to let that incident go, and truly trust each other again, this story would have had a happy ending.

After a strange noise that Rian believed translated into a burp, Ryoto was plopped firmly back behind the bars of his crib for a good old hand-chewing session. The raven-haired baby's newest hobby was gumming his round, dimpled fist and chattering all the while, thereby slathering drool over every object he came into contact with. Lee was just beginning to resign himself to the fact that no matter how much detergent they used, the smell of baby spit was stronger than French perfume, and clung twice as long.

Dropping back into his chair, Rian's Jounin husband cocked his head to the side, staring contemplatively at his son through the white plastic of the makeshift bed he'd been able to piece together a few weeks before Ryoto's unserptuous arrival. Kami, sometimes he wondered- what would life be like without his little Chibi-Chan?

This little, fragile creature he had had a part in creating. It all seemed like a surreal kind of way for these tiny people to come around to existing, but here he was.

A perfect, entire little person, all in miniature. There wasn't a day Lee didn't look at Ryoto and feel amazed at what he saw. Ten fat little fingers and toes, all of them lined with perfect, petite fingernails and toenails. A new, unscarred face with those little dimples when he smiled, and fluffy, downy hair that smelled so clean and fresh- and those little bug eyes that looked just like the ones he saw in the mirror. Ryoto was this little creation, combined with the features he saw every day in Rian's face, and the ones he knew she saw whenever she looked at him. It was some sort of magic, that.

"It's kind of neat to think that he's made of little bits and pieces of us, isn't it?" he blurted out, staring with a contented smile at his son as Ryoto began to blink himself to sleep, murmuring at ever-quieting tones.

Two bowls clanked to the kitchen table, followed by the bang of two forks hitting the sides as Rian plonked the utensils into the mound of stringy, bloated noodles.

"Yeah. Your sex life, my waistline. Our time, our money, our sleep, our energy-" she listed, trying to keep a straight face.

"Well, I think he's worth it." Lee added, tilting his head at the soft, even rise and fall of Ryoto's tiny chest.

Rian glanced up, her gaze meeting that of her husband's as he peeked over his shoulder at his wife. A tiny smile curved the edges of her lips up, and she plonked backwards onto a chair, before groping for her bowl of sodium nourishment.

"Don't kid yourself. He's more than worth it." she muttered, slurping a mouthful of Miso noodles much louder that Lee might deem necessary.

That was the thing. Rian might not have been as vocal as Lee about her affection towards her son, but than again, she didn't need to be. There was already a bond between the two, one that Lee could never replicate in all the love he felt for Ryoto. Mothers and children were already entwined of hearts, even before the latter was even born; Rian loved her son with every fiber of her being, and had even the times she'd wished that he would just die, because of the possibility of the destiny he would have forced on him at birth. Even than, she'd loved him enough to not want him to experience the pain she had lived half of her life with.

It was a twisted kind of love, but now, as she watched this tiny miracle curl onto his back and tuck his little legs underneath him, she wondered how she could have ever wished him away. Whether he was the protor of this curse or not, he was still _her_ child, her baby, and the thing she'd carried next to her heart for seven months. Nothing would ever break that bond. Not a village's hate, or a monster's low whispers in the dark of the nights.

If Rock Ryoto grew up with nothing more than his parent's love to fall back on, he would be just fine.

Lee gave her a half smile, before setting to slurping away at his own Instant dinner. Geez, he hoped he wouldn't be raising his son on boil-in-the-bag rice and spaghetti. This couldn't be healthy for them, let alone a growing child like Ryoto. Oh, well. At least they had a while before solid food became an issue.

Lee positively squirmed at the thought. Ugh. Colic, than teething, and walking- running, scraped knees, academy days, Graduation, his first mission, outgrowing clothes, Chuunin exams, puberty, injuries, Jounin tests, girls, teenage hormones, Anbu entrances, S-ranked missions- Ryoto would be cute for a while, but gradually, that lovability would strain as his son grew into a man. It seemed an impossibly long time until the baby scrunched in the crib to his side would be shaving, and joining the Anbu, but he knew once they were there, the days since he had been a tiny, fragile bundle of suckling red skin who needed his Mama and Daddy would seem just as far away. The possibility slightly frightened him- His little Chibi-Chan, growing up when he wasn't looking.

He met Rian's eyes with a smile. He could see a mirror of his own thoughts in her clouded, purple rimmed eyes.

"Oh, gosh. I gotta get going. Natto's going to have my head if I'm late." Rian's chair squeaked against the floor as she pushed her chair back from the rickety card table that substituted as their kitchen table, the linoleum squealing in protest as she went tearing into the bedroom to snatch her Anbu uniform from the dresser's top shelf. Despite their house being an utter pig sty, their Anbu armor was always cleaned to a hilt and stored in boxes out of where the dust could get to them. Rian and Lee had worked hard for their Black Op ranks, so if anything deserved proper care in their home, it was their regulation Shinobi trappings and belongings.

Jerking her T-shirt off, Rian shivered as the stale, biting cold of the back room hit the scars along her flat chest. The tip of her seal, stark black against the white of her pale skin, poked over the edge of her sweatpants. In a flash, a black turtleneck had replaced her well-used sweatshirt, and she was clapping her chipped, time-worn chest plate over her abdomen and rib cage. She hated to look at her body any longer than necessary. Maybe it was an old habit carried over from her traumatic years as the slave of the Neko, being taught to be ashamed of her human form- She didn't know. Nor did she have time to think of an explanation.

Slamming the door open with her shoulder, Rian hopped down the hallway on one foot as she tried to yank on a sandal onto the other. The strings of her Nekomata mask were clenched between her slightly pointed teeth, the porcelain banging against her collarbone with every lunge forward she made.

Finally, in a display of complete Rian-ness, the Nekomata Jinchuuriki fell flat on her face with a YELP! For a Shinobi of insane dexterity and catlike agility, Rian still somehow managed to entangle herself in her own feet on a regular basis.

Lee winced at the thud of her smacking the floor face-first, the flop echoing through the living room. To the day, the sounds of impact still made him flinch, but it was easy to remind himself that they had put those days behind them in exchange for a new future, and force the thought from his head.

It would return soon enough, he knew.

The tattoo resumed against the Living Room floor, before Rian bounced into view, headed for the front door on one sandal, her hands flipping to jerk the other one around her foot.

"Hey, hey, hey! Aren't you forgetting something?" Lee asked, glowering at his wife's back. Striking an overdramatic charade of the way Rian usually stood when dragging Ryoto everywhere with her, Lee jutted his hip to the side and plopped a drooling, nattering bundle of blue pajamas directly onto the perch he'd created. The hand not around his son's back found it's way into a fist against his femur, and his left foot began tapping the ground anxiously as he tried to give Rian his most stoic, humorless glare.

Spinning around, Rian's face lit up at the sight of her family, and Lee's overdramatic prose. Seated on his hip, Ryoto had awoken without fuss and was continuing to gum at his pudgy little knuckles as though they were his only interest on the entire earth, light blue sleeves bunching at his podgy elbows. Black, wispy hair was already forming shingled bangs toward his moggy, dark green eyes, and was it just her, or had his hair been combed into something resembling a bowl cut by a certain pseudo grandfather she knew?

Whooshing across the room, she scooped a screeching Ryoto into her arms, hugging his roly-poly body to her chest as she sought another whiff of the new, baby-sweet smell that clung to his thin, fuzzy hair.

"Oooh, Pookey. Please don't kill Mr. Mom while I'm gone, okay?" she sighed in a low whisper, smiling as though she expected the child to respond. Naturally, all Ryoto did was screech a little bit, and cover Rian's shoulder and neck with sticky drool, but still. It was pretty dang cute, if you were watching the scene.

Jiggling her chattering son in her arms a little, Rian tried to capture the scent of her child into her memory forever. It was just pre-mission jitters, was all. She hadn't been on one in, what, four months? Lee had forced her to take a leave in her fourth month, and she'd been a boil on the behind of Konohagakure's populace for too long. She needed to get back into the Shinobi groove. Maternity leave was over, and it was back to work for momma. Naturally, she would a be a little nervous. That was a given, you know.

It was just butterflies in her stomach, she told herself; not grim foreboding.

She was caught in an off-guard gasp as Lee swept a squealing Ryoto from her grasp and plonked him onto the shelf of his hip.

"Sorry, buddy. It's my turn." Lee apologized, before reaching over to cup Rian's cheek in his palm. Leaning forward, the Jounin caught his wife in a saccharine, sunny moment of meeting lips, wondering at the chocolate Poptart taste that had seemed to linger since their first kiss. It never failed, and it was an unconscious memory he carried of her, along with rippling olive irises and the smell of a crisp Autumn day.

After a few more moments than they should have spent with lips locked, Ryoto made himself firmly known by shouting and waving both round, fat little fists sporadically at the lack of attention he was receiving.

Breaking deepening embraces, the couple stole glances at their offspring, who was now looking blankly at them as if to say, "I didn't say anything. Why are you looking at me?".

"No way, pal. She's mine." Lee said solemnly, before turning crisply and depositing a protesting baby back into the white cage of his cradle, above the flapping of pajama-clad arms and screeches pealing from his son's throat.

She knew, as green-clad arms snaked around her back and drug her into his embrace, he was stalling. He really didn't want her to go: she knew he liked it better where she was protected, safe, within arm's length. She could feel the tension beginning to rot the air between them, filling the apartment with a flat, moldy smell above the frenetic scents of one another. He was worried about her ability to protect herself on the field, worried about her not coming back from this one, worried about the billions of things that could go wrong on a mission and result in a new set of characters scratched into the Memorial stone.

Losing herself to that final kiss, she secretly thought he was overreacting. But, that was what she loved most about him, when it wasn't suffocating her; his amorous paranoia over her.

To Rian and Lee, it was only a few days she would be gone. Unfortunately, Fate would make it more like a couple of years.

"I really have to go." she muttered in a throaty exhale, slitting the electric, passionate wrestling of tongues and teeth. Her tone was reluctant, filled with the intention to defy orders and stay with him, but with a loathing mark of timbre to her strict summons.

With a distinct sigh, Lee straightened back into a defeated slump as Rian slid away from him, hands ghosting off his flannel overshirt. Sad, hungry eyes followed her across the room, watching her calloused fingers twist the doorknob, her shoulders heave with a raring sense of excitement to be back in the fold, a million little idiosyncrasies playing out before him like an aged slideshow.

"Hey. It's only a week. You'll be glad to have me gone." Rian teased as she slapped a waist pouch around her hips, the weapons concealed within it jingling as she belted the strap beneath her navel. The shruiken pack around her right leg folded against the bandage beneath it. She'd have to rewrap it somewhere on her trip, or she'd get one hell of a chafe mark, he found himself absently thinking.

"You know I could never be even remotely happy without you here." he pointed out, the timbre of his voice much more passionless than he would have wished. Detachedly trying to form an excuse for her to stay behind was making his vision and speech impassive, anyway.

Watching her yank the edge of her black, long-sleeved shirt over her waist, Lee caught a flash at her slender hand just before a white gauntlet hid it from his view. She'd never taken that thing off, had she? It didn't matter that he'd gotten it out of a vending machine when they were fifteen, and he'd been almost to embarrassed to give it to her than.

No. She was still wearing that plastic toy ring like a band of pure gold. That was her wedding ring, even though she'd received it years before Lee had popped the question. She'd insisted on it, even when he'd offered her a better one countless times. To make him feel better, however, she'd trekked to the same little machine and fed it quarters until it coughed out a plastic-wrapped one exactly like hers, which he had dropped down the bathroom sink last Christmas.

"Well, I dunno. You'll probably be too enthralled with Chibi-Chan over there to miss me. Don't steal all my hugs, OK?" she asked, dialing a piece of well aged twine around her wrist and knotting it tightly.

Lee had found a distressed kitten in the bushes when they were sixteen. It's trembling, fur-patched back had shuddered time after time as the tiny cat gagged, and they had immediately recognized that it was choking on something. Rian had massaged it's tiny sternum to coax it's body into ejecting the obstruction, while her concerned boyfriend had made whimpering noises at his inability to assist her in the saving of it's life. A minute later, the kitten had wretched, hacked, and vomited a coil of thin string from between it's fangs, before leaping up and tearing off through the bushes without so much as a 'thank you'. The memory had stuck, and Rian wore the piece of twine around her wrist like the most priceless string of gems, fondling at the fraying edges of the cord during melancholy stretches of time.

He didn't know why she never asked him for more. String and cheap plastic, piles of bills and tender kisses couldn't be enough to build a relationship on in their day and age. Wilted flowers and a few traditions were hardly enough to keep two young adult Shinobi together, bound by strings of the heart. Any woman in their right mind would have walked out on Lee years before, when their financial situation started to cave in and they'd had to resort to the lowest of the low to put food on their rickety table. Rian was crazy, to continue to live in this hovel with him, fiddling the prime of her life away with a full blown, unattractive, obsessive man like himself.

And, even she would admit it. She was crazy. Suddenly, a smile bloomed on his face, cheeks tingling as the corners of his lips curled.

Crazy in love. Just like him.

"I'll make him save some for you." he replied, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning the small of his back against the square side of the countertop.

Rian turned, smiling half-mast at him. The desperate look had materialized from his eyes and address. Now, there was but the long-standing, content and confident Lee she knew and loved standing feet from her, flannel shirt unbuttoned and his white undershirt stained by shady blotches of baby formula.

"I love you, Lee." she said, beaming at his unshaven chin and black-rimmed eyes. At his dirtiest and smelliest, there was a rugged sort of handsomeness to her husband. The tender appeal of a young, sleep-deprived father that sated her visual hungers. The reason he was splotched and smelly was because he cared, and he stuck there when she needed him, taking the 4 a.m. feedings when she was too tired to even be roused by her child's cries and still finding the time to surprise her with half-burned pancakes once. And that was the clinching factor. Lee clung to her through love, not obligation. So many men would have buckled under the weight of parenthood and monogamy. Lee had been more than eager to accept it, all while carefully considering her feelings and needs and prioritizing them ahead of his own. Lee was a gentleman, a tender lover, a compassionate person, and a more dedicated husband and friend than Rian deserved. She no longer even thought twice about trusting him, responding to his touch, loving him with more heart than she had ever loved anybody. Memories of his fists connecting with her face were little more than dusty flashes, like the déjà vu of a nightmare in broad day: Lingering, but never really there enough to burden her.

And she didn't even need to contemplate what he would say next.

"I love you, too, Rian."

Tilting her head adorably and beaming at him, Rian slinked towards the front door, as though attempting to decide a reason to return to her home and his warm, comforting arms. But, her duties lay in the completeion of the mission she had been summoned for, no matter how cruel the seperations were. The string 'round her wrist and the ring nearly a part of her finger suddenly began to glow with their importance. It didn't matter how many miles were between them; there were always memories and the burning initials they'd carved on each other's hearts to keep the other alive in, and there were silver, unbreakable threads of love binding them to each other, no matter how far apart they stood.

"Give Pookey his goodnight kiss for me, too?" she asked.

"Of course."

"And make sure he doesn't sleep on his stomach?"

"Yes."

"-And keep Ai from feeding him cheese popcorn, again?"

"Yes, now go!" Lee chuckled, before straightening to his full height and cracking his shoulder blades, as though he were ready to go tearing after her the moment she stepped into the hall.

With a grin and a flourish, Rian twirled and strode out the door, porcelian mask scraping against the back of her chest plate and sandals tapping the beaten, minty carpet of the nicotine-scented hallway.

Every footfall carrying her away from him was like a kunai to his heart, the sounds beating in his ears above any thundering pulse of blood. Her barely audible steps, cracking of knuckles, swiping the last taste of Lee from her lips as she strode towards the stairs, each one made a riveted indention in his mind as he stood, lost in a vermillion sea of care and fear-

And the time-after-time denied worry that he would never see her again.

Lee whirled on his heel, bent quickly into the crib behind him, and tried to mask the fact that he was crying in a Raspberry to his squealing son's tummy.

* * *

"Would you like me to get that for you?"

Kura's head bobbed up as though she'd heard a threat, ponytail bouncing as she gazed at the thin lips that had uttered the question.

"I thought you believed that kunoichi should be able to hold their own." she spat back, voice laced with venom at the mocking question. Chin tilted in defiance, she set to struggling with a strap on her pack that wouldn't buckle once more. Her gloved fingers had been fiddling with it for a few minutes now, and she was growing quite annoyed with it, ready to just Esuna the stupid thing.

A sigh escaped Natto's lips, ruffling the shaggy frames of dark hair around his face. She wasted so much of her nipping attention on face-saving threats.

"I also think that anything should slow down a mission, be it a comrade near death, or a retarded buckle." he replied, dropping to his knees and snatching the sack from her lap faster than she could protest.

Truly, the two members of Cell 19 had been carefully guarding smoldering sparks of hate against each other: The vindictive, icily silent Natto, and the fiery, autonomous Kura. Tensions had been high since they were grouped together, and in the recent months, the taut tolerance of each other was growing to hot to handle. She couldn't stand his angsty, contained swaggering, and he was barely keeping his calm over her flagrant, self-reliant attitude.

Both thought the other hypocritical, and annoying enough to verbally express their dislike of them. Strange, though, because once it was said and done, they simultaneously realized that the behaviors the two chose to gripe about were nothing, under normal diress, that would have aggravated them.

This was never admitted aloud, only shoved away until the next time the other's presence became the target of pent frustrations.

Stocky fingers picking at the cloth strips and metal trappings, Natto seemed mildly annoyed at the task before him, feeling Kura's death glare melting the back of his neck. The energy this child wasted on outwardly expressing her mutal dislike was deplorable. At least he didn't waste his time on emotions and silly fixings like that.

"When were we supposed to leave for this mission?" he asked in a prickly timbre, the annoyance cresting in the words enough to teasingly display his aggravation at the lateness of their cellmates while carefully creating average conversation between the two. That was a huge area of accomplishment to Natto: Balancing his words just right to intellectually defeat his "opponent".

Verbally dominating Kura was just more satisfying because she so boldy contrasted his colorless existence, he told himself. It wasn't an addiction, he promised, all though he wouldn't admit that it was becoming one.

Bare shoulders shifted in a shrug, and a flash of gold glinted at Kura's neck. "I don't know. As soon as Rian-sensei shows up, I suppose. Sachi got out of this one on some sort of 'family leave', or something."

The plainness of her Anbu uniform betrayed her, he found himself deliberating on. Kura's usual outward deckings were flagrant and loose, nonsensically flattering. Knee-high boots and tasseled skirts hanging low around her waist, with skin-tight, fingerless gloves and chains of dangling stones around her wrists. Flashy, distracting trappings of a girl who seemed hardly concerned with her appearance. He wondered how she took the time to apply such little trimmings, as to give him enough of a hinge to create a dollop of annoyance on. Real Shinobi should not be concerned with such clacking, vibrant items.

"I can't believe she actually had a child." he stated, as though he were the one without sin, casting the first stone.

Kura's head twisted with insane speed, her perfectly shaped jaw dropping open tantalizingly. Had, had this prick just-

"- And just what do you mean by that?" she asked, visibly tightening the arms crossing her chest to keep her huffing chest concealed. If he was insulting Rian, he'd tred on sacred ground. Kura respected Rian, and appreciated honestly all the woman had to teach. She'd grown, in fact, to be somewhat of an authority figure to Kura, who looked up to her as an excellent Shinobi and a friendly, feminine shoulder to lean on in their mission-free moments.

Natto peeked over his shoulder at his teammate, catching the respite in her request. He'd hit pay dirt, he could tell. Hm. Those pursed, ruby lips could do with a good smudging, those strands of golden oxblood she called bangs a good disheveling. He was glad there was a zenana of his mind he could contain these shameless thoughts concealed within. In his head, there was no respite for such thoughts: They were his and his alone, so why should he feel mortified by them? Such an action would only be a waste of energy, he was sure.

"I mean that I am in disbelief of her stupidity, and iniquitous capitilation to human pleasure." he stated slowly, as though wondering if she would understand his vocabulary. Mocking her was the way to win this battle, and only than could he taste the sweet cum of his victory.

Delicate jaw dropping, Kura's gem-like eyes snapped open in disbelief at his bold, insolent accusations.

"Excuse me? You call _producing another generation of humanity_ stupidity?" she repeated, in disbelief of Natto's willful attack at Rian's condition. Hadn't that woman been on the battlefield long after many pregnant kunoichi would have retired themselves to home for the safety of their children? Hadn't she seen Rian being picked up and forcefully dragged home from the training grounds by her concerned husband ? Conscious escape of Shinobi duties by becoming pregnant, even Kura might fault. But, Rian was still dedicated to her ninja duties, returning to the fighting even when she should have still been recovering from her son's birth.

"Rian is at the peak of her Shinobi career. By submitting to indulgence, she took at least two years from her period of time to allow benefit to her country. And Lee, by doing the same, created a distraction for the dreams he chases, ridiculously driving himself to paranoia over a small, unproven life. Both are insults to the country they claim to protect." Natto explained, his voice collected as Kura's rage began to swirl, climaxing for ejection. Smugly, he began to prepare himself for the onset of personal pleasure her temper tantrum would bring.

Even so, he spoke the words because he believed them, not because he knew they would aggravate Kura's temper to the highest, most blissful extent. Natto's world consisted of the colors black and white, no grey shades. There was life, which consisted of being a ninja, and nothing more. Interaction with others was distracting from the purpose he was born to fulfill, concerns other than tactics and what techniques he should use utterly useless, and tempting him to endeavors that would hamper him in his existence as a tool of war.

But, even though he wouldn't admit it was a human pleasure, destroying the ridiculous confidence others seemed to have in others and themselves was the only hobby he dared indulge himself in. Because it was Kura who first dared show him courtesy, Kura who peaked his curiosity at her mélange of cool detachment and enough taunting ability to live and be content with herself, Kura who was a smatter of grey in his black-and-white world, and Kura who kept him awake at night with carnal thoughts, he got the most amount of ecstasy from prevoking her and allowing her to strike time after time at his unfeeling, emotional barriers. Hurting her from a safe position where he couldn't be counter struck. It was all that simple, really. Just like he was.

"You're wrong, Natto. By 'giving in' to 'weakness', as you put it, Rian and Lee-sensei created something beautiful, something not related to our world of death and rampant destruction! They made a life, together, a display of their true and pure love for each other. And Lee's, quote, 'ridiculous behavior', unquote, is the way a decent and responsible man _should _act when he creates a child! And so what if it took them from their duties for a while? Children are miracles, and more than worth it. We may be Shinobi, but we aren't entitled to give everything to our country. We're human, no matter how much you don't want to believe you are."

"Silly young girl. Love is but a trifling coil of temptation to be shrugged off in favor of a truer dedication to our caste occupations. Lee's obsession with his wife's safety and condition undermines the very Nindo he swears to. Children, I have nothing against. Creating them, and the willful pleasure their conception entails is what I do find gravely offensive. In layman's terms, I resent the fact that they couldn't wait to get in each other's pants until they were of no more use to their country. Than, as you put it, they could become human once more."

"You talk about being a ninja like it's a religion! What we dedicate ourselves to is our's and ours alone's decision." Kura susserated, her lips curling back to reveal pearl white teeth. "Lee dedicating himself to Rian isn't deplorable. It's beautiful. In a world full of jerks like you, he has the courage to love and to live, and Rian has the bravery to trust him in sheer absolute. And you find the fact that they didn't wait until they were half-dead and probably separated by death to reproduce? If every Shinobi followed your crazy little idea, there wouldn't _be _any Shinobi. And, I'm not a silly little girl! Don't you ever call me that! "

Natto's hunched shoulders suddenly rippled as a wave of masochistic pleasure overtook him. All the pussyfooting and prodding, and he'd finally struck Kura's core. He'd stripped her defenses away, and lain a crushing blow to her lust for trust and responsibility. He stored this confirmation of his suspicions away for future information. His sneeken knowledge of her past was indeed confirmed. Time for the evening attack-

"You hate being called a little girl? Why? Being a big girl wouldn't have stopped your mother from getting raped- Oh, I'm sorry. Did I say, 'forcibly taken'? How about, 'gave herself to the Kazekage like the whore she was'-"

"Don't you ever talk about my mother like that!!" Kura nearly screamed, stabbing a finger at Natto's chest. She didn't care how he came to know about why she had left Suna, or about the invaded feeling it gave her knowing that this unfeeling creepo had personal dirt on her. All that mattered than was clearing the woman whos features she'd stole's name. Whether Natto thought it was a waste of enrgy or not.

"My mother was a strong, amazing kunoichi; the Sandaime Kazekage picked up common women by the cratefuls, and promised them secure futures in exchange for their innocence at his beck and call. You know that. That man was a hypocrite, and a liar to his country; an uncaring, filthy pervert. My mother did what she thought would keep me and my siblings alive!-"

"Oh, but maybe if she hadn't, all of you would still be alive." he sardonically sympathized, mocking her diress by drawing up an invisible violin and pretending to play it, background music to her self-inflicted, pathetic retelling of her horrible past.

"And maybe we wouldn't! Maybe we all would have starved to death or been killed in a sandstorm before the assasination squads came out and murdered my little brothers and sisters!" she screeched, far beyond the point of caring what Natto mocked her with. The desperate desire to right the support beam within her he'd collapsed was nothing to the personal insult, or fear that anyone might overhear them.

"And you survived by hiding from them? My, Kura. We're not a very brave little girl now, are we? Am I to believe that dedicating herself to the Kazekage was beneficial to any of those your mother called dear?-"

Natto's smirk never fell as he caught the kunai headed straight for his face between two fingers. The handle of the knife twanged with impact from the speed it had been thrown at, and from the close range it had been flung from. Kura's clenched eyes were shimmering with welled tears of pent pain she'd carried since a young age, that, as usual, would not give her the relief of falling.

More than anything, she envied Rian. To have such a lover to fall back on, to be able to create a baby that would be cherished and appreciated- Kura had vowed when Lee had come to training with the news that she would stay alive long enough to see that the child of her nearest friend was cared for properly. She wouldn't see another baby grow up like her mother's little hoard, starving and naked as they wandered the streets on their barely-sharpened Shinobi skills, with no one to keep them safe from harm.

A lump struggled down her throat. No. She would never, ever watch another precious miracle of life be debauched and deflowered, or hear another baby crying for nourishment to be poured into it's swollen stomach, or listen to the chattering of tiny, broken teeth as the near dozen of them huddled in a sod edifice that should have been condemned years before.

Never, _ever_, would she blame her mother for what she'd done. Always would she put the fault at the feet of the man who's hands were smeared with her mother and sibling's blood. Sunagakure was a village that hid behind walls of it's own animosity, and dirty little secrets ran barefoot and red-haired through the streets in search of a home. Their "beloved" Kazekage was no more than a fat, depraved monster who's ungodly spawn sent prostitutes to their grave, all for his corrupt and deviant pleasure. And when they were becoming too much of a complaint, they were picked off like scabs.

Assassination squads had plucked the children from their sleep, jerked them from hiding, and passionlessly slaughtered every child that resembled their Kazekage. So many of them, their tiny carcasses littering the streets, being run over by ox carts and feet as though they were no more than dirt when the wicked morning had finally come-

There was a reason she was alive, one of these debauched posterities who had escaped the genocide of nearly half her generation. Kura was the one who would retribute the person who had caused so much pain to his village and her.

She hadn't left Suna of her own bitter, vice-strong will. She'd been beaten and left outside the gates to die after she'd stolen into the Kazekage's fortress and nearly slit his throat. The Sand couldn't have it's dirty little secrets become public, now could they?

She was a survivor, and stronger than anything a coward like Natto could throw at her: He hid behind his words, a notorious shield for a weak character. Kura had learned to see underneath the underneath long, long ago.

"Running from me is like running from your past." Natto growled, lowering his face to less than an inch from the snarling, tear-filled expression of Kura. Her snorts snuffled into wetness on his skin, bringing his cold, unfeeling self to a rosy climax of enjoyment. He'd harmed her in a way no Shinobi technique could. He'd hit her emotions, his words sure and deadly true to their target while hers just glanced off of his armor of self-assurance.

"It always comes back to-" he murmered, gazing directly into her twitching, watery, deep-green-into-the-depths-of-his-soul eyes.

"Bite you."

"Hi, guys!" Rian screeched, stepping from behind a bush and spreading her arms as she beamed from one ear to the other.

Natto obligingly flung Kura's repaired pack into her lap, smirking the entire time. Well now, was she going to tell on him? Let's see how grown up Little Girl really was.

"Rian-sensei!" the teen cried, her pack sliding from her lap as she hopped to her feet. In seconds, Kura was hugging her lanky body around Rian, ecstatic to see her mentor and to be away from Natto's mental torture.

Rian patted the back of Kura's shining, red-tinged hair, wrapping the other arm around the girl's waist. At least someone was happy to see her. Of course, Sachi would be making a noise in general if she were there, and Kura would be using Suna techniques to try and splatter the preppy medic across the clearing while Lee would shout for the chaos to cease. And Natto might even managed a snort at the spectacle, if they were excessively lucky that day.

"Ooh, Kura! God, I missed you, girl. You been keeping Natto over there in line? Because I _know_ Lee wasn't- " the Jinchuuriki huffed, getting a noseful of the girl's sandy red hair as Kura hopped backwards to examine her at arm's length. After all, Rian was much thinner since the last time she'd seen her!  
"He's being an angsty prick, and Lee let him get away with murder. How's Ryoto?" she replied, trying to wipe that conversation from her mind. There was joy to be had, now. Rian-sensei was back, and she'd make everything better.. Well, as much as they could be better.

The smile bursting on Rian's face was absolute at the mention of her infant's name. Kura had been enthralled with him the few times she'd had the leisure to visit. Ryoto just had a way of worming his way into everyone's heart, she sighed. That, and adorable, bug-eyed babies everywhere.

"He's great. Probably driving Lee into a canoe with all the drooling he's doing, but great. He's gained like, two pounds, I'll bet. Lee was showing him some Polaroids of the Team and some friends of ours this morning, you know, letting him hold the pictures and repeating their names in the Alvin voice, and he tried to eat your's and Naruto's pictures. I can't decide if that's a good thing or a-"

"May we _please_ be going now, ladies?" Natto asked once he was on his feet, clearing his throat: The picture of silence and decorum once more.

Rian scowled at him positively. She knew what he was implying. She'd seen enough of Natto's stoic, unmoving demeanor to build a clear picture of what he was hiding behind that stony mask. Well, if he wanted to be a 'perfect' Shinobi, he could listen to Leader's orders and go sit on a kunai for a while.

"Heck, no! You're just gonna have to get the bee out of your underpants and wait around while I finish bragging 'bout my baby! I didn't spend all that time in labor to _not_ be entitled to _some _bragging rights!" she shouted, raising her arms above her head in sardonic emphasis as she stared the Chuunin in the eyes. Oh, the murderous intention that glinted in Natto's for an instant-

Resigned and laughed out of defiance, the man whirled on his heels and faced away from his cell members, looking anxiously toward the road as though it would move closer to them if he did.

Kura blinked, before stifling a giggle. Ha! Take _that_, Mr. 'I've-Got-A-Kunai-Up-My-Rear-End'! Score two for the girls.

Rian's face contorted into a toothy half smile, before she smothered a snort by continuing their conversation.

"Anyway, he's all but driving us up the walls with all the talking he does-"

One freakin' hour of chattering women later, Natto finally sighed, and twirled on his heel to glower at his leader and cell mate.

"CAN WE JUST GO ALREADY!?!" the normally disconcerned Chuunin shouted, the forest around them startling to life with his sudden scream.

That was it. Sixty minutes of listening to talk about men's "sizes", the spawn of Rian and Lee, and a Regency film special on A&E had brought Natto to a new level of insane. There was no way a sheerer form of torture existed. (Had he said this aloud, Kura might have stated that periods were much, much, much worse, she knew for a fact.)

Yes, Natto had gone unglued. If he heard the name "Ryoto" or a comparison of Kiba to Shikamaru one more time, he was going to commit hari-kari on a freaking _stick_.

As if she suddenly remembered he was there, Rian turned to him, a mock look of surprise painted across her face. Kura's gaze followed, her lips whipped into a Machiavellian smirk.

"Oh, Natto! You're still here!? Well, honey, I just plain forgot you were there. By all means, let's head out. Right. Um, Kura. Would you mind starting out ahead of us? I believe I have something to speak to our dear Natto about."

Unassuredly, Kura strode towards the dirt path, keeping her chin even and her gaze away from Natto's poisonous glare. Boots nervously clipping the ground, the teenager tried to glide with as much confidence as she could through the curtain of sheer, absolute hate Natto tried to encase her in.

Scowling, the male Chuunin watched Kura's back fade as she walked farther away. That horrible, insolent little- When he got done with her for tempting him from his usual façade of coolness, she would be _wishing _those Assassination squads had killed her.

His body was still flushed and sticky with sweat, coming down from the high he'd gotten from feeling her anger bubble of his inflictions to her emotional state. That was his drug, and she was his best hit. There was something there that made Kura so much fun to dredge a reaction from, something that someone with a less twisted and distorted mind than Natto's would call a "crush". But, in a world where he had forced himself to believe that he was forbidden to love, Natto's way of expressing the feeling he didn't know he had was to taunt Kura, and let her orgasmic anger quench his lust for care.

"You."

Rian's hiss sent spittle misting onto the back of Natto's head. In a reflex, the ninja flinched, allowing Rian the moment to wet her lips and continue her murmered threat.

"You think I wasn't there. You checked all around, using your amazing self-created Shinobi power, to make sure that I wasn't here, so you could verbally beat her up like the big bully you are. Well, guess what? As skilled as you are, I'm ten times that. I was right behind you, breathing down your neck, and I heard every word. I'm warning you now. I will _not_ have you speaking to her or any of our allies in such a manner again. And if you so much as _blink _at her the wrong way on this mission or any, I will have you delivered back to the Village you claim to love so much _in pieces_."

Natto continued to stand, keeping the mask up, his eyes wide and his breaths shallow.

For now, he had to pretend to be afraid.

"I won't." he said simply, without turning to look at the woman that had been appointed his 'leader'. Soon enough, it would all be over. He just had to be patient. Rian would never mock him again, or Kura. No one would. _He'd_ see to that, personally.

Rian eased back, straightening her body and gripping one shoulder, letting that arm flap limply as a sigh escaped her mouth. Sure, Lee lets the prick dance on the roof of a cop car for five months, and she gets the workload once she comes back. She _should _have just stayed home and snuggled with Lee and Ryoto, getting drool from her son and slobber from Lee all over her. The apartment's couch suddenly seemed even more inviting than before she had left.

She sighed, covering her mouth with her left hand. It was going to be a very long week.

"All right, let's go." she ordered, dragging a hand through her hair as she began to follow Kura, who was waiting loyally a few hundred meters away from them for her team.

Natto's smirk was absolute as he slowly rose to his feet, letting his pale palms grind against his sides as his face curled with the curdling thoughts of a purely insane mind.

Rian didn't know she was walking right into a trap.

**A/N: Uh oh.. Well, it wouldn't be one of my stories without something horrible happening to everyone's favorite character. Review, please.**


	7. Shockwaves

**Author's Note: I'm behind on writing, so I'm gonna update. Not that anyone cares, really. Well, SOMETHING HUGE IS GOING TO HAPPEN IN THIS CHAPTER. You'd best read. Now.**

Lee heard the rhythmic tattoo of Shinobi sandals depressing the light green, almost mucus-colored carpet of the hallway, strides reaching towards the opened front door of the Rock's apartment, number 301.

His mind immediately registered that the footfalls did not belong to his wife, which brought forth a murmur of disappointment from him. However, Rian was due back from her mission _today_- he'd marked it on the calendar and slashed off the days with a chunky, purple Sharpie dry-erase marker since the first day without his beloved wife-, and should have been returning _any minute_, in truth. This alone sent a childish bubble of glee welling inside of the Green Beast. The days and nights, though drool and colic filled, had seemed lonely and empty without that familiar presence at his side, nudging him out of bed under the admonishment that 'It was his turn, dammit', and refilling his spent energy tanks with her sarcastic humor. He'd missed the butterfly kisses against his neck that were light enough to make him shiver, and the way she made Instant Curry come out his nose when he laughed too hard. He desperately wanted tickle her on the back of the knees, just to hear her throaty laughter. Needed to kiss her hot and hard in the hallway, where all the neighbors would whistle at them. Lusted to shudder when she tippeted her fingers over his scarred and misshapen knuckles. Longed to feel her kicking him in her sleep when she suffered a nightmare, just so he could fill his arms with a trembling, venerable Rian and reassure her that everything was alright.

Ryoto had filled his every, waking (and sometimes _un_waking) moments, but it was Rian who was keeping him lost in his private thoughts. He missed her with the passion of a lover separated, a teenaged boy at college thousands of miles away from his girlfriend; a man truly bound by the silvery strings of love to his soul mate. Without her, life was like walking in slow-motion through a colorless, repetitive daydream. Only when she was back, and he could clench her in his arms tight enough to promise that he would never let go, would colors stain his world once more, and life's nippy and rapid pace could reassume. And even than, he would be able to keep up with that pace, because he would have his running partner back.

So, although it wasn't a heart-wrenching, obviously angst kind of death, Lee was still dead on the inside without Rian there. His heart might have still been beating, but it was cold and lifeless without that special woman to pour it's love out on, and he might have still been smiling, but they were Harlequin masks for the long, pouting frown on his soul as he anxiously glanced out the window in search of spotting her tacking happily down the sidewalk.

Ryoto let out a wailing, squeeing screech and kicked both of his legs into the air, before resuming his idle chatter at the dust mites circling in the air, naturally, the jabbering flowing over the podgy fist transfixed against his tiny lips.

Grinning, Lee heaved himself up from where he'd been seated on his hands and knees, examining a char mark on the tile floor like a concerned therapist. Bare hands slapping the countertop, Lee bounced to his feet and cracked his aching shoulder blades with a groan. In moments, he was wiping a smug, jovial smile across his face, and leaning into the sputtering, drool-covered face of his child, watching Ryoto's dimples magically appear at the sight of his father.

"What, little man?" he asked, watching Ryoto wince and smile even brighter. He was such a good little baby, really; never really crying more than talking, and getting much better about sleeping through the night. Really, Lee and Rian were truly blessed to have such a quiet child. … Okay. Maybe not exactly quiet, but you get what I'm saying. Not a whiner; just a chatterer. He'd make himself heard later in life in ways that nobody else could, his dad was sure of. Ryoto's future, though years ahead of him, was bright and clear to his eager, optimistic father. And both of his parents would be there every step of the way to make sure that it was there, they promised each other. That mouth would carry him far, as well as the protection two dedicated parents could provide.

"You miss your momma?" he asked in the same cheerful tone, leaning closer to the muggy, sharply-tinted glimmer of his son's swamp-green eyes. They'd melted into almost as hauntingly green a shade as Rian's while she'd been gone; In a week, Ryoto had changed so much. Rian would never believe it once she saw him-

If she ever saw him. Where was that troublesome wife of his, any way?

Ryoto chattered a string of consonants back, kicking his foot into Lee's chin gleefully as his tiny eyes lit with the joy of having his Daddy watching over him, big face inches from his own. From this, Lee gathered that the boy missed having his mother to answer his nightly screeches as much as Lee missed Rian in general. Children needed two parents around to nurture them, anyway. Rian and Lee had grown up without families of their own, and together, they swore that they would recreate the childhoods they'd never had for their own son. They swore that they would be there, no matter how impossible the situation, or how far away one of them strayed on a mission. Even if death did separate the two of them, at least they would have tried their best to provide this environment for him. But, of course, death seemed such an sickeningly realistic fate, Lee seemed to block it out, half with his own optimism, and half the insanity even thinking of such an ending procured within him. If a Shinobi spent every moment thinking about death, he would soon have to be admitted to a mental asylum; It was a delicate balance for ninja, between the beauty of life and the copper-scented carnage of death, but they walked the fine line between living and walking dead from the horrors they'd experienced every day. To be afraid of death was weakness, but even the strongest of Shinobi wouldn't admit that they feared the loss of their own lives, or worse- The loss of their loved one's lives.

But, he thought, swearing away all thoughts of tragedy striking those he loved the most- Soon enough, their little family would be complete. Just as soon as Rian walked through that door- Than, the only unbearable thing would be the seconds until she was in his arms and their lips were meeting. Just a few more minutes- any second now, he promised himself, childish anxiety welling within him and pushing away the doubts for a moment.

The swish of strides slowed to a halt in front of the opened front door (Lee had left it ajar so Rian could creak it open and send him flying from whatever he was doing to greet her with all the pent anguish of missing her.), and the burning, weighty presence of a tormented soul manifested itself in the doorway, eyes peering at Lee's hunched back in complete and utter shock.

Lee, who had reached into Ryoto's crib and was letting the boy tug and squeal at his long, calloused fingers, smiled cheerfully when he heard the familiar pats of black sandals cease in the doorway. Although it wasn't Rian's steps he heard, the presence was still a familiar, friendly one, and a visit, though unexpected, was a most pleasurable way to wait out the arrival of his wife and the return back to life.

"Good morning, Neji." Lee hummed cheerfully, fondling his fingers as Ryoto began to gum them, somehow managing to get his father's digits into his mouth and slathering them with saliva.

"What brings you here on this fine, youthful day? Did Tenten need something?"

A morbid, eerie silence went unnoticed by Lee, who had closed his eyes and was enjoying the pressure of his son's heart beating against his palm and the warmth of Ryoto's podgy hands reaching up to pat Lee's knuckles, the baby's shimmering eyes crossing as he attempted to focus on his Daddy's hand. Neji continued to stare at Lee's back, and even than, the hollow glance began to lick at Lee's senses, arousing a small sensation of impending danger.

"Rian isn't going to believe how much he's changed! I'll bet Hizashi and Mikami are getting big, too- Lookin' more like their mama every day, huh?" he laughed, feebly trying to marinate the quiet and engage his teammate in conversation. Neji wasn't much of a conversationalist, but he did know how to speak. If he'd just come for a 'visit', for whatever purpose had driven him to the Rock's home in search of his goofy, bowl cut teammate, he should at least say something.

Instead, no response surfaced at Lee's question. The room was beginning to lace with a deadly, phantom kind of quiet, unlike usual silence. A perturbed, lavender gaze remained fixed to the back of Lee's jumpsuit, watching with every sensor as his teammate ground his shoulder blades in discomfort at the quiet. Still, Lee did not turn to face the Hyuuga's leader, feeling Ryoto's tiny chest rumble underneath his hand as the infant cooed happily. The silence still pervaded over the next few seconds, and even small Ryoto seemed to quiet to a frightening level of lack of vocalization, almost in respect for the words that would decimate his future forever.

As long as Lee had known Neji, he'd only heard- no, sensed the boy so deathly quiet once, and felt the same hollow, lost gaze-

When Tenten had been left on those golden fields in a bloody heap of silken skin, her crimson life splattered against the pale teenager's arms and face, never to wash away.

Feeling a shiver ripple up his back, Lee still refused to meet Neji's gaze, afraid of what he might see there. He didn't know that Neji was speechless with shock, unable to grasp how this had happened, or how Lee would ever be able to bear the words that would cross his pale lips. Blinking falsely, the black-haired Jounin exhaled loudly and crossed the tile floor of the kitchen. Snatching a glass from the strainer of dishes he'd cleaned, Lee tried to shield himself from the stunned aura that had impregnated the room by focusing on pouring himself a cup of soda. Sugary water gushed from the two-liter bottle as Lee's fingernails crunched the plastic sides, bandages crimping with the anxious twitches of tendons. Finally collecting himself, he welded his gaze to the rim of the glass, watching the carbonated water bubble in time to the anxiety boiling in his teammate as he flung the empty bottle of soda towards the trash can. Still, he refused to even look at Neji. There was a steel-hard determination there, one that would carry him through the next unbearable months of healing from the mere sentence that Neji had been commanded to inform him with. A few words. A few words would destroy every foundation of living and life that Lee had ever built for himself.

And Neji had to say them.

"Of course, I'll bet you're praying that Hizashi got his grandfather's face, huh? It would be fitting, since he's his namesake, and all-" Lee droned, eyes still riveted to the glass cup in his hands. The tiny, dank reflection of himself in the dark brown soft drink mirrored the hopelessness of the situation. All jocund senses had materialized into the grim, foreboding sensation that had swallowed the apartment, and the sunny afternoon suddenly seemed closer to the dying embers of the night than ever before.

Something was wrong, and the fact that Neji wasn't speaking outright only brought horrible conclusions to mind.

It was only than that Lee happened to let his gaze crawl up from the veneer of wood that made up their living room's floor. Solemn, iced-over sable reluctantly skulked in defeat, crawling up the well-worn cloth of Neji's broad-sleeved shirt, over the bulging scroll pockets of his flak jacket, past the mat of wind-mussed, chocolate hair, until he could meet the overwhelming amount of stunned disbelief emanating like a tsunami's waves from the pearly eyes of his closest friend.

"Neji, for god's sakes, what happened?" he found himself blurting, unable to rip his attention from the uncharacteristic shock visible in Neji's expression, nor the eerie tippets of a poltergeist's bony fingers up and down his spine that made his body shudder time after time beneath the jumpsuit that suddenly felt frozen to his body.

"I mean, gods, you barge in here looking at me like the dead just rose up out of the ground and stand there, all stunned and quiet. What's going on? You're as white as a gh-"

There was a moment for Leeto rasp in a breath that burned like fire before everything in the entire world bottomed out, utterly and entirely, and the trip towards the end began with no promise of return.

"I-I'm sorry, but it's my duty to inform you-" Neji began, a lump fighting it's way down his throat. The words had battled their way through the fog of surprise on the entire detached stroll to the Rock's home, little goblins of teasing fate laughing away Neji's sanity with accusations and guilt of the acutest kind.

Oh. So it was a Hokage-summoned duty informing. Lee knew the prim, detached tone and the beginning of the speech he'd had to recite before. Well, something had obviously happened to a group of Shinobi he and Neji both knew; that would explain the formal façade of speech Neji was trying to assume. The Hokage had sent his teammate to officially inform him of whatever tragedy Neji was trying to stutter out.

Lee was too busy being mildly annoyed to even connect the dots, and realize that the horrific fate he'd sworn away countless times was about to smash him from all sides. Whirling on his heel, the Jounin's heavy eyebrows lowered to crease his eyes into angry slits, jumpsuit rustling and sandals squeaking on the wide, rough slats of the wooden floor.

"Well, hurry up and inform me. I have things to do besides listen to you chew on your words, Neji. Rian's coming home today, and I still have to do a couple of things before she-"

"_I regret to inform you that your wife, Rock Rian, has been killed in the line of duty while serving in the line of Shinobi duty._"

There was nary a word to disturb the displacing, macabre instants before the realization flooded the apartment, and turned the entire world into an upside-down wind tunnel. The cup that had been in Lee's hand shattered into a rain of glass shards as it was dropped and exploded on the floor. The familiar sights began to crumble away, and one of the three inhabitants of the room fell millions of feet in seconds, innards curdling to eject the burning knowledge of the truth, while denial fired and refired feebly behind a pair of lost sable eyes.

The lump in his throat thudded to the bottom of his stomach, and Neji could only narrow his eyes to blink back a trace of the pain speaking had brought. There was no way he could meet the detached, horrified expression that he could _feel _gazing emptily from Lee's face, or bear the weight of hollow, dead expressions that garnered questions that had no answers for lessons that weren't really lessons. Neji's heart fell securely into the churning darkness of his curdling innards as his head dipped towards the bleeding spiral of where the floor used to be.

There was nothing else he could say.

But than, he'd said quite enough, hadn't he?

"I'm very sorry."

And the Grimm Reaper swept out of Lee's apartment with nary a sound to betray the mass that had settled on his heart.

"WHAT HAPPENED!??!"

This rasping scream was accompanied by the slam of two fists on the top of the desk before the blonde, strong enough to send hairline fractures splintering the wood of the writing table.

With a characteristic squeal, Naruto lunged backwards at the sudden explosion of noises, sapphire eyes nearly bulging from their sockets. The cup of pencils to his left rocked dangerously to the right, before tipping over and spilling it's contents across the already mess-covered desktop. Papers fluttered to the dark crimson rug beneath the two Jounin's feet, and a few crusted ink bottles sat expectantly, ready to flood the treaties and war documents with their pitch-black contents at the smallest shove.

Sucking in a deep breath, Naruto slapped one hand to his bang-shingled forehead, grinding the heel of his palm into the worry lines that had suddenly sown themselves deep in the skin as the shock of his sudden awakening began to wear off. Geez! Didn't the good villagers of Konohagakure know never to barge into the office of a Hokage and slam around in front of his face!? God, he'd just gotten to the good part of that dream, too-

"Gods, Geyi Mayo. You scared me to death! Don't ever wake me up out of a sound sleep again!" the boy rasped in a sleepy screech, lazily rubbing at the crust around his eye with the flat of his wrist. Lips twisting into a pout, the Orochidaime Hokage lowered his thin eyebrows and swiped with the other hand at his mane of golden hair, flightily checking his nobling feature's appearance.

"That kind of stuff was okay when we were kids, but as Hokage, I forbid ANYONE to barge in on me while I'm napping between paper work breaks!" the kitsune child called, nodding to himself in an exaggerated fashion, as though to boot the thoughts to his mental To-Do list.

It was clear to even the laymen nowadays who was the father of Uzumaki Naruto: The sharpening spikes of sunny, yellow hair, the electric blue eyes that seemed deeper than even the most endless of pools, and the almost princely chin of the Leaf's beloved Yondaime were more than eligible in the face of his son, marred only by the deepening whisker marks carved into both cheeks. Uzumaki Naruto had grown into a fine, dashing young Tokubetsu Jounin over the past seven years, and had more than earned his newly-appointed, long-desired title of Hokage. Simpering smirks and the mischievous nature, however, stayed with him, even unto his age of 21. The princely traits of his honorable father were no match for the shimmering amounts of childishness in his eyes, and yet still he remained like a panther, easily slipping from the guise of adult maturity that his country required him to posses, to the tantalizingly petty silliness that pervaded even his most stoic of social veneers. In essence, Naruto was still Naruto, just with a five o'clock shadow and the titles and trappings of a leader of Konoha. So, naturally, the rambunctious young man would much rather have been outside, practicing his Rasengan or having a training match with one of his old friends, than incarcerated in his office, stabbing feebly at the ever-growing mountain of paper work that seemed to be trying to bury his desk. Oh, the suffering one had to endure to be a Hokage. He'd been trapped in this musty room for _hours_-

"Answer me, Uzumaki. WHAT HAPPENED!?"

Blinking between the slats of his fingers, Naruto opened his eyes wide enough for the first time since he'd awoken to completely study the intruder to his messy workplace.

Ah, yeah. It was Geyi Mayo Bushy Brows, sure enough. The soup-bowl hair cut falling to shield his face from Naruto's view, the green spandex clinging much, much too tightly to the most sensitive regions of his anatomy, the bandaged fists as they lay clenched and quivering over the document Naruto had fallen asleep on-

Oh. Lee…

Naruto's eyebrows immediately lowered in sympathy, his expression pinching as a sigh began to roil in the back of his throat, laced with the poison of his own bubbling thoughts and remise. Oh, Kami. Lee wasn't going to take this well at all. But than, he could hardly be expected to, could he? Naruto himself had been so angry upon hearing the news that he'd immediately began to call for dispatches to go after the bastards, but she'd made him swear that he would-

"Yo-you sent him, t-to tell me, a lie." came the hiss from between Lee's elbows, growling anger browning just beneath the surface of the words, daring Naruto to confess that he had indeed _lied_ to him, and scared Lee out of his mind. We-he-hell, he'd figured out their little trick, yes indeed. It was all an elaborate _joke_ at his expense. Every one was trying to remind him how he should never, ever take Rian for _granted_ again, like he had so many months before- That was it. It had to be it. Neji had to have been kidding. Death couldn't have come in the wee hours of the raven night before, when the world seemed so perfectly aligned to the snuffles of a sleeping, innocent child. No. The whole world could laugh at it's ten second joke on Lee, because he _wasn't falling for it_. Rian was coming home any minute now. He knew it. She was too alive, bastards. He could feel it. Dumb ass, childish prank by dumb ass, stupid bastards. She would probably be there when his feet carried him home faster than any flee for his life ever had, holding their son and berating him for leaving the poor child alone while he'd ran to plead the Hokage's confession of it's prank on Lee, and the whole, whole thirteen seconds of terror would seem like nothing more than the roiling clouds of a storm that had just passed. There would be _life_ in those sparkling, verdant eyes and he could hol-hold her close and kiss her until his fears were nothing to the reality of her heart beating against his.

He _knew_ it was all a prank. It had to be. It. Had. To. Be. There was no way- No way in hell that Rian, Rian was-

SHE WAS ALIVE, DAMMIT! Naruto was wrong, Neji was wrong- They were all- It was a cruel, heartless stab at his mending layers of trust in himself, and an underhanded attempt to make him feel as though he hadn't been able to protect her. It was a joke. A prank. A restitution of a sick mind. Rian- Rian couldn't be, be, be- He shouldn't have let her go, ever- Should have made her stay home- Why would these people say she was- She was only twenty-one. She had a baby, a husband, and, and he lov- he loved- And there was- Ryoto- And she'd, she'd promised-

… That smiling face couldn't, just _couldn't _be, .. Gone…

The shift of white robes signaled the slash of Naruto's head to the side as his golden eyebrows creased, fingers knitting atop the desk before him and shoulders going rigid with an unconscious effort to bring poise and rationality to the sea of chaos he could feel swimming behind Lee's eyes.

"No, Lee." Naruto addressed, for once using Lee's full name rather than 'Geyi Mayo', as he usually was known. It was a form of postpartum respect, in a way. Rian had hated anyone to make fun of Lee, and several times as a teenager, Naruto had found himself with a Sanken claw rammed directly up his rear end when he went too far with the eyebrow jokes. The title now seemed rather fitting, along with the curtain of supreme respect of the anguished tensile that had seemed to descend over the small office. Raining over the hunched shoulders of the angst-ridden man and swathing him into his own vacuum of anguish as his thoughts swirled like a massive tornado behind the façade of a clenched expression.

"No. I'm so sorry, but- there was an ambush to her group- They slaughtered the kunoichi with her. Absolutely slaughtered her. She's in the Hospital, but there's not much they can do for her, other than give her a place to lie until she goes of her own accord."

"Kura." Lee noted, his tone rising to a higher, tear-strained pitch at the mention of his young student. Tears trembled on his silken eyelashes, but would not do him the relief of making trails down his cheeks. The reciprocating belief that nothing had been decided yet- that Rian was still alive- was so strong, that Lee could hardly bring himself to _cry_. Rian wasn't dead, after all. She wasn't. She just wasn't. She just, just, just, just, just waaaaaassssnnn'tttt- And the more he repeated the words in a sing-song tone to drown out the wretching seize that struck his stomach, the more he brainwashed himself into believing it.

Rian was not dead. She was alright. Maybe she was okay. Maybe she'd been injured. Maybe she had lost both of her legs and an arm. That was alright with him. He loved her no matter what. Maybe she had third degree burns on 90 of her body. That was good. That was okay. He'd take care of her no matter what. Maybe he'd kiss her on a charred, burned cheek, and maybe when he pressed her back to the wall for a deepening embrace, she'd whimper in pain. But, whatever it was, she wasn't dead. She wasn't. She might have been in a coma, or just asleep. She might be deathly injured, or even a vegetable. But, she wasn't dead. She wasn't. He'd promise her every harm he could think, but not the end of a life that had barely even begun.

Lee was so determined, even when he was laughing in the face of the Grimm Reaper. It was almost pathetic, really. Hope-inspiring, yes. But, even the paragon of hope and determination couldn't open the prison gates that were sealing away Lee's hopes and dreams.

In truth, that hope and resistance was doing something Lee had never allowed it to do before: crumble. Every second, every single maddening second the Hokage's eyes remained narrowed at his shuddering back, electric blue slits oozing with a false sympathy that made Lee's stomach tighten with an unfelt mixture of repulsion and fear, was another blow to the wall he was trying to hold up against the forces bashing against the other side. They were trying to make him cave in to the terror, trying to entice him into the throes of understanding, trying to seduce him into believing in this grim reality that everyone seemed to think was real- Every moment that he was ensconced in this horrific, terrible- No! It couldn't be- It just, it just- Not Rian. Dear, god. Not her.

It wasn't true, it wasn't true, it wasn't true- The sing-song mantra was filling Lee's every thought, blocking the biting synopses of what seemed to be- No. It wasn't the truth! It never had and never would be! Emotions rapidly swinging between hysteria and disbelief, sorrow slammed against Lee in waves, sometimes of realization, and than sharp defiance of this nightmare that was playing out all around him.

The world was closing in on him, around the space of one word, one bated, poison-tipped breath of decimating declarations of death. Everything was narrowing, his life and entire future buckling beneath his feet as he stood, eyes riveted to the yawning abyss of uncertainty, feeling fear wriggle in through every previous strength he had encumbered himself with. Suddenly, suddenly, everything was gone- Rian was- But she couldn't be- And he, but she- The words no longer made sense. Only the constant, hypnotic sutra of disbelief was eligible in his fracturing, shattered mind anymore. His fingers were curling against themselves in the damp, glacial depths of this jailhouse within himself, the truth a cage that his head repeatedly beat against in an attempt to block out the long-lost words that whispered oh-so-slowly mantras of loss to summon the gut-curdling sorrow, and make him believe that she was- He was terrified of these four walls, because these iron bars were holding his soul to the toxic radiation of all he never wanted to believe. And all he could see was her.

Rian- Rian was- She was- He loved he- And she was-

.. He couldn't even let himself think of the word.

"Lee, would you like me to walk you home?"

And suddenly, Naruto was asking him if he wanted to go to that place. Home. It wasn't _their _home any more. Did he want to go back to that apartment and face the ghost of the woman he loved more than life- Did he want to backtrack and pretend that nothing was wrong? Did he want to believe that he hadn't heard or seen anything? Did he want to hold that reminder of all he and Rian had had, Ryoto, like nothing had happened, and wait for Mommies who would never come home? Did they really think that he could even, believe that she was-

"Did you leave Ryoto by himself? Gods, Lee. For all the effort you put into blathering paranoia over that kid of yours, and you just up and leave the poor thing- I'll bet you didn't even close the door behind you. He's just a baby, man! You want some sick prick to come in and-"

"What happened to her?"

Naruto's chair creaked, which was enough to tell Lee that he'd given his friend a startle with his blunt, impassive tone. He hadn't really meant to sound so heartless. It was just, there would only be a matter of time before it really hit- And he wanted to know. Needed to know. Otherwise, the specter of uncertainty would follow him home, and rape his mind through the twilight hours with horrible possibilities of what could have brought Rian to her end. Oh, kami, for all the worry and panic he'd felt over this possibility- Why didn't it all hurt as much as he thought it would, yet?

Reaching up, Naruto combed detachedly at his golden locks, as though jerking the patches from his scalp could remedy the problem. It just wasn't fair. It was not damn fair. Lee loved Rian so much, and they'd just started a family- They were thick as thieves, and so, so damned much in- God. How could the powers above take something so beautiful, and turn it into this mangled piece of trash, along with everything else in their world?

Why had Lee, who'd never bothered a person in his life, been beaten down to the withered husk of a person he would become? What did Lee ever do to anyone? What did those two do to deserve being separated, other than love each other so implicitly, so perfectly, with a pureness that made everyone feel so guilty for not being with someone they could feel that way about-

Why would Ryoto have to grow up without a mother, and why would Lee have to deal with another rocking blow to life and living?

What kind of sick, universal justice system called that fair?

"Th-they were…"

Duty beckoned, and Naruto had to push himself hard to keep from focusing on the tiny quiver of Lee's lips. He had to push himself hard through the pain, just to be able to speak for Rian where Lee's beloved couldn't. In the swathes of the afterlife, Rian wanted him to know what had really happened. Even if she wasn't to the afterlife yet.

It probably wasn't wise to tell Lee the truth, but something about the man's heart-wrenching pitch and crumbling resistance to this horrible twist of fate made the words come, even as he bunched his muscles in preparation to restrain his friend, if Lee should immediately leap up and go flying towards the unthinkable. In a refund of the pain Lee was experiencing, Naruto could at least muster up half of the truth.

"Akatsuki caught them a few miles away from the gates of Konoha. It was three against two, and they made their target very clear-. The leader said that they would be leaving with 'their' Nibi one way or another- Rian and Kura probably could have held them off long enough to reach Konoha, had it not been for your little weasel of a Leaf Chuunin. Now, this makes me pissed as hell- We've just discovered that your 'Gekkou Natto' bastard has been a sleeper agent with Akatsuki since he joined your cell. The prick has been gathering information on the Nekomata for months, feeding it to them so that her capture would be inevitable."

At Lee's shudder and return to silence, Naruto sighed, and parted his mouth to speak again. If Lee wanted the truth, he was going to get it, no matter how much it hurt the both of them to hear it repeated. Naruto was angry, now. He was angry at himself for not double-checking this odd man, who appeared by all accounts slightly 'off', and angry at the world for ripping something so precious right out of the arms of one of his dearest friends. And now, knowing Lee-

"The three, whom we've now identified as Uchiha Itachi, Hoshigaki Kisame, and my village's newest Nuke Nin, pretty much turned your Subuku No Kura into a pile of shredded coconut, before capturing the Nekomata, and apparently dragging her off to some god forsaken cave to unseal the Nibi."

"So, she's not dead."

Naruto caught the grave, winding tanking of Lee's next idea in is voice. Even though he couldn't read the expression on the Jounin's countenance that was obscured by raven hair, Naruto could sense the tone and change of pitch in Lee's high timbre. Of course, you know? Lee never gave up, even in the face of such odds as these. Even if the odds were stacked against him to this great sum, his first thought would automatically be to go blitzing off after Missing-Nin who could probably kill him by just glancing in his direction. It was admirable, the paradigm of hard work he'd pieced together on the foundations of "I can do anything as long as I put my mind to it". But reality served a very, very different shot, and a single Shinobi with love in his heart and no ninjutsu or genjutsu skills couldn't even in theory face even _half_ of one of these Nuke-Nin. No matter how much he believed in himself, or wished upon a star that he could.

"No, Lee. She's as good as dead. Akatsuki has her, and they're going to extract that damned cat one way or another. And you are _not_ to step two feet out of Konohagakure, or I'll have you locked up until we're certain that she's go-"

"What!!? You're telling me that there isn't a _chance_ for interception!? She's- She's my wife, Naruto! How can you look at me, and tell me that I'm just supposed to let these bastards make off with everything I love in the world!?"

Gone was the veneer of sorrow. Now, in it's place was that monster of anger once more. But this time, it would be poured into a worthwhile cause. Rian- There was still a chance. Lee had been so afraid, and thought she was gone forever. But now, they might be able to- She wasn't gone, after all. He'd known it! And for a moment, everything had been so, so wonderful, because she wasn't gone to some invisible world of the dead, and he wouldn't have to follow her into the dark.

But now, Naruto was saying that- Why on earth couldn't they!? She wasn't gone, yet! There was still hope! Did this man even think for a _moment_ that Lee would sit idly by, and watch Akatsuki, or anybody, make off with the woman he loved most in the world!? If he did, he was crazy. Lee would be chasing after her even if the damned Akatsuki was fobbing _cannonballs_ at him. There was no way that Naruto, Orochidaime Hokage, would just sit by, even in the most political senses, and let these people make away with one of his country's Jinchuuriki. At that much, Rian was worth national attention. Giving up another Biju to the criminal organization was just furthering their evil plots, which no one had quite been able to discover the bottom of, yet.

Her monster was worth that much, and Rian was his container. They should at least want to repossess the Nibi, to keep it from the hands of those who aspired to do evil with it.

For her, Lee would even acknowledge that monster's existence.

"There's nothing we can do about it, Lee-" Naruto retorted, lunging to his feet from his office chair, rather than give Lee the satisfaction of domination by height alone.

"Nothing?" Raven eyebrows leapt in disgust, unbelieving the gall of what the man he had once called _friend_ was proposing.

"Nothing? The strongest Shinobi country in our nation can't gather a handful of ninja to defeat ten- _nine_, excuse me, nine men, and retrieve a single person!? If anything, she should be a top political priority! What about that monster? Are you going to let Akatsuki get away with this, you, you bastard!? They took the only person who means anything to me, and you're just going to sit by and let them take her life, because you're too _lazy_, or whatever the hell is keeping you from calling out a few Shinobi to stop a damned _threat to Konoha_-"

Gasping over the sharp keens of sobs, Lee refused to back down. He was in a verbal wrestling match for Rian's life, and he wouldn't show even the smallest edge of a wedge for Naruto and his idiotic ideas to sneak in. His chest swelled with the channeling of energy, flooding his mentally and emotionally fatigued body with the strength to carry on this fight- What on earth was keeping Naruto from commanding a handful of Shinobi to go after that damned cult, anyway? How could- how could he just let them make away with Rian, and that beast that should have held more dogmatic importance than her as one person? Naruto was one hell of a Hokage, wasn't he- Cracking under the pressure of his first major threat to his village, after all the hot air he'd blown as a child about becoming 'the greatest Hokage ever- Believe it!', or so Lee suspected. Some village shadow.

"They've got one of _our_ country's Biju, and one of _our_ Shinobi, and you're not going to retaliate, or even make a move to-"

"You go look at the bloody heap of flesh they reduced your student to, and tell me that you want to agitate them!"

Pointed teeth clenched, Naruto drew back one fist, as though to collapse the smug, anger-contorted face framed by shingled bangs, mocking the impudence of his decisions- gestating into a gallous tumor and ridiculing his fears. Legs spread and one fisted hand to his desk's top, venomous anger smoldered in the blonde's eyes, making the color like the licks of a sapphire glow with inner fire and the energy of the turmoil churning in his mind.

"These aren't little kiddie ninja, Lee! They're down, hard-core, Nuke-Nin, and we have no clue as to their weaknesses, how many of them there really are, or even where they carted her off to! What we do know is that Uchiha Itachi alone killed the entire Uchiha clan in less than three hours, and Hoshigaki Kisame is one of those Legendary Seven Swordsmen Kiri-nin gigolos. Just because you picked off one of their members doesn't mean they couldn't splatter an entire army like corned beef hash when they're all together! Lee, these Shinobi have the reputations they do because they're some of the most _dangerous threats_ around! We- I. _I_, can't just send my best soldiers out after a single ninja, let alone one that possesses a Biju when they're protected by some of the most dangerous Shinobi in the land. I'm hurting too, Lee. I am. You know how much I liked Rian-"

"Not enough to think her worth saving, I see."

At the scoff, Naruto nearly lunged forward, fingers fisting and nails nearly drawing blood from the calloused skin of his palms. Lee had shoved aside any sorrow for the time being, instead using it to support his quivering body as he crossed his arms, the ones that had been broken time and time again for the sake of bettering himself as a ninja, creating an impenetrable cage over his heart, flinching as he inhaled a deep enough breath to fuel to his next burning insult, and focus all of his blackened despising into a glare as steady as the beating drum.

"No man brave enough to be called a Village Shadow.. Should cower in fear, even in the face of such memorable eyes as those of an evil cult, such as Akatsuki. One Shinobi, who is loved more than life itself and holds a force greater than any mortal man, should be worth chasing after. That creature of hers- If they get their hands on it, not only will we lose the greatest person _any _of us have had the good fortune of knowing, but we will also be sending the Leaf to hell in a hand basket. If they capture another Biju-"

"Correction. They already have."

The words struck Lee like a silenced 45. Slug to the heart. A flinch twitched up his gaunt body, and the shock exploding on his face at the abominable, despicable, something-he-couldn't-name that was throbbing for ejection at the base of his heart was more than visible.

The electrical tension that had surrounded the two Shinobi like a miasma of choking poison was crackling into coexistence with grateful gasps of oxygen over the next few seconds of empty and loftily condescending gazes meeting, as Lee and the Hokage began to adjust to the new degree of unnamable emotions they'd discovered all in the course of a few minutes. A yawning canyon had opened up between the two, the ghosts of futures they'd always assumed would happen to other people opening the earth beneath their feet to the uncertainty, freeing the memories to exhume themselves and consume all sanity they could find. A bitter sob wrenching in the back of his throat, Naruto found his sapphire-colored eyes blinking shut, pressing back dusty tears as his lips pursed, covering clenched teeth and sealing the exit for any pathetic noise that wanted to escape from between the Hokage's thin, firmly pressed mouth.

"She's gone, Lee."

Ignoring Lee's impassive gaze and the surroundings spiraling away into an unrecognizable mix of blood-colored carpet and acidic chakra, Naruto swiped at his face with his forearm, dotting his robe's sleeve with the tears that had squeezed their way out of his eyes. Dear, god- Rian. One of his closest friends, trusted confidantes- Lee's everything.

"She's gone." he repeated, feeling the icy missile of comprehension train towards the pit of his stomach, where it would detonate in the form of realization. Rian was gone, whether by human error or a play of fate's fingers. Rian had been his friend for years, and he had always felt that she and him had shared a special connection, through the monsters sealed within their bodies.

They were Jinchuuriki, and they had countless times silently rostered the spirits of the other by simply existing, enduring the same hardships over their growing-up years. Rian had been a wonderful friend, quietly serving those she called Precious and fighting just as hard as he had- no, harder, because she couldn't glean her Biju's chakra- to become a recognized and respected ninja. She'd given Lee a reason to live when he must have just wanted to fall down and give up, and she'd even been the one to introduce Naruto to Hinata, the girlfriend he was nervous to ask for the hand of. Rian had put salve on his scratches, and been there to watch his back during more intense missions than he could probably count. He'd called her friend, and crushed on her when he was a teenager. And Rian had done it all her way, dealing with the most manipulative monster he'd seen in his years, suffering under the Neko's thumb when she was a child and taking the same grate as a container of a monster that he had. They'd understood each other through the bond of the spirits they shared their bodies with, and built withstanding webs of trust since they'd become friends. Rian was a mother, a wife, an unbelievable Shinobi, the greatest friend he'd ever had-

And she was gone.

And suddenly, he was crying. Naruto was sucking his lip into his mouth, and sniffling against the linen of his sleeve, the only world he could comprehend in the face of the friend he would never see again that was flashing through his mind like a slide show. Never mind showing a weakness in emotions. Never mind that he was a Hokage, and supposed to be strong enough to support a nation at every given moment. Rian was _gone_, dammit, and he wasn't strong. In an instant of impact, of realization, Naruto was two quarters and a heart down, and he just couldn't let himself forget how her voice had sounded. Now mental photographs and what he could remember of her words were all he had left of their friendship- And he'd always needed them just to get by.

Muffling the sobs against his shirt's broad sleeve, Naruto let himself lost to a bittersweet, passionate torrent of some of the most painful tears that had ever formed on the tips of his eyelashes, a procession of consuming memories battering him from every direction. His thoughts twirled into knotted mats of incomprehensible, sorrow-flavored words and letters that didn't coexist as eligible sentences, like cotton candy spun of grief. Hallucinogenic visions of the faces he had lost paraded in front of his clenched-shut eyes, figures and memories cavorting in wild frolic to the tune of the madness pressing against the back of his head. A huge part of Something was falling apart within him, from the haunting memories of the lives who'd had to leave- Today and any life that might be worth living was "It can't get much worse" vs. "No one should ever feel like..", from that day on, now and forever more. And there was a finality to that- a kind of half-crazed sense to that detached judgment.

"Oh, god. She's gone." whistled into the tear-stained sleeve of Naruto's shirt.

With a sniffle, the golden-haired young man lifted his head, eager to find consolation in the equally swollen face of someone who missed her nearly as much- more than, he dared say, he did. If he felt this deeply over the loss of Rian, than- Lee's suffering must be unimaginable. He was Rian's husband, her lover, her partner and outright, passionate love for he-couldn't-remember-how-long. How-how could Lee even think, right now? How could he even be sitting there, when Naruto felt like falling over and dying from the pain of missing her. What _was_ Lee feeling, anyway? Could he even feel? Comprehend? Was he too numb to go anything but quietly cry, or was he screaming with sobs over Naruto's, and Naruto was just too lost in his own sorrow to hear him-

"If there's nothing more you have to inform me off, I believe I should be getting home."

Just that. Words so icy that they made a shiver ripple up Naruto's back, as though Lee had breathed the smart of winter into the room in that statement.

He heard the screech of Lee's chair against the floor, and heard the sandal stomps register against his numb ear drums, and the slam of his office door so hard that the glass window fitted inside of it shattered before he really realized it. They _needed_ to cry together, Rian's closest friends. They needed to cry, and release all that Naruto had welling inside him, which could only be a thousand times worse for Lee. Naruto almost wanted to run after Lee, as he heard the Jounin round the corner of the hall on his way toward the doors of the Hokage Tower, grab him by the shoulders, and listen to him drown out his own sobs with the screams and moans of his anguished, tortured soul at the loss of everything that had ever mattered to him. He wanted Lee to hug him like he had when they were kids, and he wanted to share a Male Bonding Moment in their anguish. They _understood_ something of the same nature- They should share it, so they could feed off of each other and grow, if that was possible, from taking a few tears and just letting them out- Naruto wasn't afraid to cry every once in a while, and Rian being gone did something more than upset him- It made him feel, feel- was there any way to describe how he was feeling? And what about Lee, and his feelings?

But, it was as he sat on the edge of somewhere between grief and a stab at the most suffering than he had ever felt in his entire life, that Naruto realized the stark truth in Lee's words and gruff actions.

Lee didn't want to share anything with him, whether he was his best friend or not, or if he was attempting to miss her as much as Lee did.

He wanted to share it with Rian.

The comforting, familiar flat of a slender palm slid between his shoulder blades as he gazed with hopeless intent towards the door a smoldering Lee had exited only seconds before, the air bitten with an icy fringe from the exchange of words. Tsunade's even breaths shattered the metronome of his own, offsetting the room even more as the two riveted their gazes to the doorway, as though they could see through the parquet wood to where Lee was stomping into the September sunshine, watching the colors bleed dark with the cloud of roiling emotions that had gathered around an entire city of lies.

"Do you think we should have told him that she ordered us not to go after her? You know, about Ryoto?" the young Hokage asked, his bare voice fruitlessly trying to garner a sort of sympathy, or maybe any kind of emotion from the heartless, welded steel he knew was filling Tsunade's hickory eyes.

A few moments of silence later, a whistle punctured the office as the former Hokage shook her head, ponytails swishing against her sage green jacket.

"No. He couldn't take it, I don't think."

Naruto continued to gaze at the hairline fractures in the tiny window, an almost childish sorrow filling his shadowed eyes like dark blue liquid.

"It was what she wanted, Lee. She wanted to protect you and that baby of yours." he whispered to a specter, as though the words could somehow reach over the keening sobs filling Lee's every conscious thought.

Tsunade knew he was trying to lift some of the burden on his young chest, and for that, her hand squeezed tentatively on his shoulder. She understood.

Sometimes it was hard being a Hokage.

And as Lee tilted his face to gaze toward the sky in request of an answer, the heavens opened, and cried the tears that he couldn't bring himself to.

"Are you ever going to wake up, Neko-Chan?"

Almost to the sadistic voice's command, the withered form of the fettered prisoner lunged to life, surprise beginning to blink in the corners of the olive-green eyes as knowledge poured into the brain that had been catatonic for at least a day, now.

A smile blackened malevolently at the corners of the razor-thin lips as the ragged woman, her clothing torn and her body crusted in a mixture of travel dust and dirt, began to fiddle at the bindings of her wrists. The hands above her head were shackled securely to the stone wall of the cavern, her scratches displayed in the vertical, paper-white cabaret of her thin, gangly arms. Goodness, how did this little pipsqueak defeat Hidan, again? Had he been that weak, truly? Well, he'd be a monkey's uncle-

"I believe you'll find that those chakra handcuffs are not quite something you can Houdini your way out of, Rock Rian." the man muttered at her immediate, desperate flailings, the words tumbling over the rim of his broad, black and red collar as he tilted his head back lazily, catching the bit of light that beamed in from the hallway against the top of his face. Itachi was right to think that this would be a suitable prison- How anyone would be able to survive in such darkness and seclusion was unthinkable, even to the likes of him, a master tactitician who had fought his way up the food chain of Kirigakure's Shinobi forces, and was now an esteemed member of the widely feared Akatsuki. Well, mental torture had never been his forte, anyway. He'd always preferred to just listen to them drowning as he filled their throats with water.

Eyes set into dark green stones, the Leaf kunoichi struggled to sit on her haunches, looking like a dog tied to wall to keep him from snapping at strangers. She looked truly savage. Almost enough like monster that was inside of her. Almost.

"Release me at once." Rian whispered gruffly, feeling sharper words bite at her tongue. It was bitten and bleeding, probably from the struggle she'd put up, escaping from the cage of Itachi's arms with no more than a savage instinct to fuel her wild thrashings.

How could she have let herself be captured by even the likes of Akatsuki? Kura, Kura was- She was hurt badly- If she'd have jumped in an instant later, maybe she could have deflected the ungodly huge sword Samehada, instead of being caught in a taijutsu spar with the unaffected armor of that murderer Uchiha Itachi's lightning-fast blocks. But, they had just been too fast- too powerful, too little time to run, and too, too many of them-

Panic began to flood the young girl's sleep-bleared thoughts as the room she had been placed in began to register itself. Hard-packed dirt with round stones built up the gutted walls of the dungeon, scratched into the earth by the primitive tools of the cavern's former inhabitants, and tarnished fetters bolted to the walls were evidence that there had been prisoners before her here.

"Don't trifle with my intelligence, Rian-Chan. Fish are smarter than everyone believes." came from the shadowy form of the cloaked, smiling man, before his sandals tapped into the pool of light surrounding the bedraggled and restrained captive he had taken. Smiling with pure, unadulterated superiority, Hoshigaki Kisame stepped directly in front of the Leaf kunoichi as she struggled fruitlessly against her bonds. Cocking his head to the side and shifting so that Samehada didn't strike the earthen walls of the subterranean prison, the Missing-Nin lowered himself to a crouch and waited for her to cease her thrashing. When she did, his stark, dead and roe-reminiscent eyes paralyzed her vision to his, as he seemed casually examine her through her terror-widened gaze.

"I'll give you this much, dear- You don't give up easily. Itachi just about had his hands full with you. Do you remember this, before we had to knock you over the head? Your little teammate just about had Natto pushing up the daisies too, before I made a Kura-Kebob out of her."

Rian winced uncomfortably, but never broke their staring match. Yes, he'd sent Samehada straight through the Sand-nin's chest, before flipping her body up and fervently slashing at the young Anbu until she'd collapsed to the ground in a bloody heap of broken bones and bleeding limbs. She remembered, because she'd chosen her cell member's sharp cry as the time to look away from Itachi for a split second. That had been her downfall, Itachi's palm snapping her head back until it cracked the vertebrae in her neck. What had become of her after that, Rian wasn't exactly sure. Merciful darkness had wrested over her as Natto landed a savage, sure punch to the back of her head, and nothing else was very clear until her past few minutes of awareness. She could have been out for days, for all she knew.

However, she thought, grazing her tongue over her cracked and bleeding lips, the pain had stayed with her for however long she had been out. Her head echoed sharp aches from the massive hematoma staining her cranium dark purple beneath her thin hair, and the broken ribs within her ground painfully with every shift of position she made. Her fingers were still slathered in crusted blood from trying to deflect Kisame's massive sword during the battle. Her neck and back ached hollowly, shoulder blades sharply displaced into jutting shelves from her back; body parts she'd forgotten that she'd had smarted with live wires of pain as her body creaked to life from the catatonic state it had been resting in.

All the while, the blue-skinned swordsman had never ceased smiling. In fact, Kisame seemed to be more than a bit amused by the whole situation. He should have been in the main room of the fortress with Itachi, plotting the capture of the next Biju, for it was they that had been called to arrest it. But, something had drawn him to the catacomb prison underneath Akatsuki's hidden lair. He'd excused himself to "go check on the Nibi" under the pretension that he didn't like Rian's shifty eyes, but it was deeper than that. Not that he'd know. All of the members of Akatsuki were a little mentally unstable- being the best of the best Shinobi they were called for the smallest bit of inhuman insanity- so forgetting what human emotions were was probably part of the package when it came to being in the most feared organization known to Shinobi-kind. If Kisame didn't know he secretly pitied the kunoichi he had carried slung over his back to the cavern that she would never emerge from, or that he had seen the stretch marks on her stomach and couldn't help but think about the child she would leave behind, than it could be considered perfectly normal, really.

Greatness came at a price. For Kisame, it was the consciousness to be emphatic.

"You'll never get away with this." Rian broke the silence with, hissing as her side hollowly screamed in a gale of white-hot pain. Teeth snapping sharply against each other, the Nekomata Jinchuuriki forced herself to put a level cap on her terror. Panicking would only make the situation worse, and giving in to the physical pain or the emotional could be deathly. If she could hold the hysterics of panic and self-repute off long enough, maybe she could plot that first fantasy that every prisoner of this underground crypt had entertained: escape.

Hope ballooning at a suddenly recognized possibility, her dirty head of brown hair bobbed up, and Rian tunneled a smug, triumphant smirk defiantly into the mocking face of the shark-man. She could feel her courage welling within her chest as both eyebrows knit in the center of her forehead, lips curling up into a neko-reminiscent leer. Even as every inch of her body cried out in pain, Rian was able to push it aside, and give Kisame her most winning smile as she loudly announced his fate. His head would roll for what he'd done, and the scare his organization had given her village by abducting her, mark her words.

"Konohagakure will never sit by while Akatsuki makes off with one of their Jinchuuriki. Rest assured, my teammates, and fellow followers of the path of justice won't stand to have me captured by the likes of you all. I suggest writing up a last will and testament."

Kisame only lifted his top lip in a scoff of Rian's little speech. Nicely done, if he did say so himself. What was that, Washington's farewell to the troops? Well, her and her little prepared speeches would be silenced shortly, anyway; Rian and her big words, with nothing to back them up.

"We'll just see about that, Rian. We'll just see about that." Kisame wheezed, before coughing loudly into his hand. The smell of soot was beginning to fill his nostrils to the point of annoyance. At least he had the luxury of simply strolling out of this charcoal sty whenever he pleased.

"Wait unto death for now, alright? Prepare another pretty little speech for when we're extracting that monster of yours for me."

He heard the dull clank of Rian's fetters as she spiked a middle finger at his turned back, but chose to ignore it. Knitting his fingers between the convergence of his cloak's broad sleeves, the blue-skinned Nuke-Nin attempted to stride as arrogantly as he could towards the line of welded metal bars that constituted the holding cell's door; he had planning to get to, as of now. Planning the fate of the Jinchuuriki, and plotting the furthering of his feared cult.

And after all, Leader-sama had said that he had some "special plans" for this little monster.

Slashes of light accentuated the fearsome glint of defiance in the scruffy prisoner's eyes for an instant, before the heavy door clanked shut with enough force to dislodge chunks of rock from the wall behind her. Plittering trails of dirt leaked from between the stones in the darkness, like running water from a broken spigot as the room seemed to empty of life.

Now there was nothing other than complete darkness and a suffocating silence only penetrated by the sound of rodent life scurrying busily through the darkness, searching for the crumbs of the prisoner before Rian's last meal of stale bread. The ancient, heavy bonds were chafing angrily at the skin of Rian's wrists, leaving red rub marks where the tarnished metal began to draw ruby red tears of blood against the sharp contrast of her wrist bone.

But in spite the dank surroundings begin to perforate her courage, Rian couldn't let her head hang, or let a tear slide past the veneer of bravery she hoped would ward away the Akatsuki member's feelings of triumph over her. Yes, they'd captured the Nekomata No Nibi- Yes, they'd accomplished their goal, it's container was firmly in their grasp, and their prize would be plucked from her lifeless body sometime in the following days.

- And yes, she was going to die.

With this, a small gasp echoed through the confines of the subterranean prison cell, and Rian could only curl her broken body to her and bury her head between her knees as the realization lanced tears from her eyes.

The fear that had stayed up with her countless nights had been realized. The horror she had never wanted to believe could occur had become reality. The terrifying end was approaching, and it's leering expression laughed at her as she lay crumpled and bleeding among rats and filth; laughing, mocking the impudence of her denial. She had become too enveloped in a sense of security, which proved to be cruelly false. Rian had let herself succumb to the cleft she'd dug for herself, and foolishly sat and waited until she was snatched from life and living by the waiting predators of evil.

She'd become so accustomed to being protected, that she'd forgotten that she had _always_ been sitting in the waiting claws of danger.

And now- now that horrifying fate that she'd always ignorantly dismissed for the comfort of Lee's arms, lying through her teeth to herself that he could always protect her even where she couldn't protect herself, was simply 'real', and the end was looming with it's usual terrifying finality.

She was going to die. She was going to die a weapon of evil, and never live to see her family or friends again. She would never awaken to Lee's even snuffling against her brow; She would never feel the press of Tenten's embrace against her weakened body again. She would never hear Neji whistle a reluctant praise toward her Shinobi skills, or a hackneyed 'Thank you' for chasing his bratty offspring. Never again would she smile in sweet approval when she spotted Hinata and Naruto together. Never again would Gai's booming laughter spur her into a new rapture of energy as teacher and student trained together on sun-ripened fields. Never again would the world seem so perfectly aligned and pure, to the strains of her child's sleeping breaths.

Death perched before her, leering in it's awesome powers of equalization, and roared with laughter as Rian mentally beat herself worse than any member of her captor's organization could. Her stupidity, selfishness, conscious denial of everything she never wanted to believe had stripped her of her very existence, and torn a fistful of everyone she loved's hearts from the façade of protection their rib cages truly were. The only person she had ever dared her heart completely and entirely would be breaking his back under the weight of his broken heart. The chattering, innocent creature that was bone of her bone and flesh of her flesh would grow up to the torture of a broken family, with a grief-stricken father and faded, yellow photographs for a mother. Ryoto would become a little boy, growing when Lee wasn't looking and bounding and leaping through life with no memories of the woman who had sang him lullabies in the wee hours of the night; No remembrance of kisses to his round, dimpled cheeks, and maybe the wind's hollow whisper of her embrace to seize him on the days he felt most alone. A cheerful Genin one minute, and the next a Jounin brandishing his Anbu katana fearlessly to the face of the darkest enemies. Strong, brave, kind-hearted, and gentle- Just like his father. What qualities would he inherit of his mother, beside his verdant eyes? Would that be all he was to him? The reflection desperately trying to reach out to him every time he looked into a mirror?

The thought of being lost and unknown to the face she carried closest to her heart was enough to send her thrashing against her bonds, crying out to the shattering of her heart for anyone that could hear. But, her head struck the solid wall after a wild flight of her aching neck, as cold and insurmountable as the grim, acrid bitterness of the truth.

How many times her skull struck the sharp edges of the aged wall, she didn't know. But, the world spinning and tipping was enough to blot the edges of the pain into dull throbs screaming over everything else that hurt less than her heart. Pounding in her chest like a caged bird, beating it's wings against it's prison cell, begging, praying, screaming, dying to emerge from the ashes of her hope like a fiery Phoenix, and wing back to the Village that held everything she had ever known and loved.

But the record just wouldn't stop skipping, and the truth just wouldn't stop slipping into her, until all what remained of Rian could do was press her face to the torn cloth of her striped shirt and try to brittley defy veracity. We know this hurts: It was meant to. Isn't it messed up, how nothing can ever truly protect you from the worst case scenario, and how when you hit rock bottom somebody always throws you a shovel? Welcome to a hell worse than any afterlife can ever be, Rock Rian. You'll have your guilt to keep you warm, and we expect a death sentence for the crime of ever being such a burden to the Village you claim to protect.

And than, in the midst of missing everyone to death, Rian suddenly remembered what she was literally dying for, and exactly what she was pressing her face to.

Head bobbing up, Rian's overgrown bangs scratched at the angry, dirt-crusted slashes on her cheeks as she struggled to flop into a sitting position. Every joint shouted in symbiosis, but the dying sparks of life in Rian's eyes could only rivet themselves to the ugly gashes across her chest showing through her thin shirt.

Tsunade was the medical expert of all the Shinobi nations, and yet there was only confusion to rival Rian's when the medic glanced at her, the hardened steel of her almond eyes sharpening to glare at the spirit churning beneath Rian' navel. She knew she was glaring right at him- she felt Neko-Chan's eyes narrow within her whenever the Sannin would give him a tested look, her eyes accusing and lips grinding the words that wanted to escape them. Neko-Chan was always subtly changing, roiling beneath her skin like an amputee's phantom pains. Sealing hadn't done much, other than hold him back by the band of Rian's willpower: Neko-Chan couldn't use his slippery tongue to feed Rian's broken mind more lies, or impress her under his thumb and control her with the puppet strings of his bipolar moods. He couldn't heal her scratches, or mould chakra-empowered shadow clones for Rian to battle against during training. His will was physical no more, but it didn't mean that it wasn't existent.

His power was overwhelming, and there had always been a heaviness to his container's stomach swirling beneath the black, curlique tattoo that marked the portal into his prison. Even Ryoto hadn't weighed as much upon her as the flow of dark, incinerating chakra within Rian; it was literally as though she shared her body with a separate entity, who performed his own actions and thought with his own mind. A hair's breadth from her every waking second, Neko-Chan had been being the classic cat for seven long, painful years. He bitterly refused contact with Rian at all times. It wasn't as though he could, but Rian could sense his emotions rolling, like the storm clouds reaching over the horizon to shroud the village in a summer rainstorm. In the affront of anger and mindless hate that made up Neko-Chan's constant mood, she was always straining against the heavy weight of an animalistic emotion that only a creature of pure evil could contain:

Neko-Chan was nothing more than a pall of hate. The murderous intent coiling within the deceptive monster filled her sleep with nightmares, and her days with a heavy sense of guilt. It was horrible, to hardly taste Neko-Chan's true intentions and lusts, and already feel so uncomfortable with simply containing his threatless entity. Neko-Chan couldn't hurt her in any way that he used to, but sometimes Rian wondered if simply being able to sense a fraction of the cat's hellish anger wasn't hurting her as much as his murderous training schedules had.

He hadn't won. He had the right to his pitiful life, and she voluntarily contained his monstrous entity, but Neko-Chan had not _won. _Rian had her own life, and she had shuffled off the coil of needing her cat to hold her hand, waiting to stab her in the back with the other one. Lee was more than her Everything now, and there wasn't any room in her heart for felines with a taste for blood when there was so much of her child to love. There wasn't a place for him in her heart anymore. Neko-Chan was a monster, a demon that she restrained for the good of the village she protected. She was no part of him, any more. No matter how many people believed she was a horrible monster, plotting to destroy the feeble lives they'd built up for themselves, that was a line she would never cross. As much as they were separate entities, Rian would never believe that she was, indeed, the monster in their relationship. At least, this belief was what kept the tears pressed behind her eyelids when a passerby would scream an obscenity at her back.

Rian lived with a kind of inner peace that drove Neko-Chan nearly insane. He would have loved to watch her crumple under the weight of her village's accusations; feel her slipping away, little by little, until there was only a withered husk of a hated, forgotten person floating in nonexistence like so much chaff on the fingers of the wind. He would have smiled as Rian fell away in chunks, and laughed at the heart that meant so much to her as it broke into millions of shards. It would have brought a creature built of pure and unadulterated, animalistic hate an immeasurable amount of joy to see something _else_ destroyed, because that was Neko-Chan's life. Death. Destruction. Hate. Creating fear. He lived, through the death of others.

But, now Neko-Chan was as good as dead; any power he had was gone. He didn't even have the right to a body of his own. He didn't control any aspect of himself, like an incapacitated geriatric. He didn't control a chakra form of flaming, dark energy that struck fear into the hearts of anyone. He didn't give orders that anyone could obey. He couldn't pull the puppet strings of a deathly concealed plan. He wasn't anything feared or great anymore: just a withered and weakened shadow of a trapped animal.

He didn't control Rian anymore.

Where he was small and dead, Rian was great and alive. From the ashes of the life he'd destroyed for the furthering of his own self-righteous grandiosity, Rian had fought her way back from the darkened corner of her mind that he had pushed and repressed her into, and arisen a glorious person, with a heart and mind and sense of independence she had never before had the knowledge to even hope for. She was a person, where she had once been a puppet. A Phoenix, alive from the death of Destruction itself.

She had to tell herself this almost constantly, to make it really seem real: Neko-Chan didn't control her, or the new life she had created from what he'd left her with.

"You hear that, you dumb bastard?" came the parched reply from between bleeding lips. Her vision was beginning to soften, darkness creeping through the narrowed slats of her eyes as fatigue began to creep over Rian's broken body. But, it had to be said, before sleep took final wrest.

She had to say it out loud, even if they both already knew it to a painful fault.

"You hear that? I-I know you do. Y-you're nothing to anyone or anything anymore, yo-you monster. You don't control me- anymore."

The silence of her cell was the only answer audible, but in the darkness of his cell within her mind, the scrap of symbiosis connecting them showed the fading, facadic triumph in Neko-Chan's half smile as he lost this battle of reality.

"You- can have me, and my life. But, you will never have his. He- he will live, because of this. And that's all that matters to me. And I can rest in peace knowing-"

With an empty clank of her chains, Rian flopped brokenly in half, unconsciousness mercifully whisking her away from the creaking aches of her battered body. But not before she could finish her declaration of the truth.

"- That I died to protect my child. Even if he did inherit my curse."

**A/N: And there's an idea of what the Rock's child. It'll all be explained in the next chapter, but let's just say that Neko-Chan is pulling the strings of another manipulating attack on Konohagakure. Please review. I'm really sad tonight, and I could use some positivity.**


	8. STORY TO BE DELETED

This story is hereby being discontinued.

I never thought I would see the day that I'd put this about one of my fanfictions, but indeed, here it is. Firstly, I think I shouldn't be dragging out the story further. Nobody is interested in it, and I'm only doing this because I don't want to let Rian go. She's my first OC, but I have to learn to let her go. I'm stretching her story more than I need to. I'm not Khazia; I can't o five fanfictions in a row about the same characters and still have people be interested. LeeOC isn't something you can do multiple chapters about.

So, if anybody still liked this story, I'm sorry. But, I need to move on to other areas of fanfiction.

I love Rian, and she'll continue to live on in fan arts and one shots. But, despite that I've been planning this story for forever- Nobody cares. I have a group of readers to think about, and clogging their inbox with a bunch of updates for a Story that nobody's reading is stupid. It's also selfish.

However, I **did** have Rian and Lee's story worked out, even from the beginning. Writer's block hasn't halted this story in it's tracks. Popular opinion has. But, as it were, the story was planned out until the end.

That end, will forever be lost, though. I am literally deleting Rian's entire future, and asking you to forget the existence of this fanfiction. It's a lot, yes, but to further serve my fans, I need to let Rian go.

And, I am.

Oh, I'll still more than accept fanart, reviews, and anything else any of you would brighten my day with. But Rian's overly-dramatic future is going to be replaced. Say goodbye to Ryoto, Wifebeater!Lee, Hyuugas Kei and Ai (who will reappear in various fics in teh future- I love the name Hyyuga Ai sooo much..), and the GaiAnko moments that would be coming. But-

You all deserve something more than my worthless nostalgia trips. I need to let Rian go for a while. She will, however, live on on DeviantArt and in our hearts and minds forever. But trust me, people- I had this story planned out, down to the very ending. But you want and deserve for me to put my writing into fanfictions besides this needless sequel. Rian was fine on her own, and all I ask is for you to forget that this fanfiction ever happened.

My sincerest apologies for dragging this needless story out to the length that I did,

-HMR-Chan

... Blow it up. XD


End file.
